Well, I guess I can't run for office in Tamriel anytime soon. [Edit as of 11/21/17] So...If I had known how politicized this video would get months after I made it, I probably would've thought twice on a few things. At the end of the day though, my main issue with the nords has nothing to do with whatever political interpretations people take from Skyrim. They're just boring, whiny, and nothing like the badasses described in previous games. That's why Skyrim made me hate the nords. Everything else is tangential to the general "normalization" of The Elder Scrolls lore that's been going on since Oblivion. To those making the argument that previous descriptions of nords were merely "fantastical accounts" and that the nords in Skyrim are simply more realistic: I hear you, I understand this argument, but hear me out for a moment... *Yes, the Elder Scrolls is full of conflicting accounts. Yes, most descriptions are made by in-game sources which can be flawed. Yes, it makes TOTAL sense for previous descriptions and previous examples of Nords to be more fantastical than "reality". You can totally explain things that way. But this begs the question...* Why does Bethesda keep resorting to this trope? Since Oblivion, it seems that every time we finally see something they've built up in a crazy, creative, and high-fantasy manner, it ends up being far more mundane and "normal" than we expected it to be. Why does Bethesda always seem to choose the most boring interpretation of everything they've created? Sure, in real life different cultures often get exaggerated and distorted by stereotypes and hearsay. But for Bethesda, it feels more like a crutch at this point. Think about it: Imperials went from tattoo-covered, greco-byzantine amazonian aristocrats following thousands of different religions living in a gargantuan metropolis surrounded by endless jungle...to generic quasi-Romans living in Middle Earth. Altmer went from math-obsessed, magitech nazi-elves living in a dark paradise with skyscrappers made of glass and cities made of coral, to generic high elves living in gray, boring "Rivendell" buildings. See, for me personally, I loved that brief moment of The Elder Scrolls (From Redguard to Morrowind) where everything was weird, alien, with crazy magitech and over-the-top races. Morrowind was never supposed to be the only "weird" part of Tamriel. There was a time when it was all weird in its own way. I get tired of "gritty, realistic" fantasy dominating the market. The Elder Scrolls stood out because it wasn't afraid to go crazy, and yet it remained grounded in very basic, relatable ways. The nords were part of this weird world. I loved the idea of them being "sophisticated" savages. A race of people that are simultaneously romanticized and reviled. You especially saw this in Oblivion, where it felt like there was a lot of racism against the nords, even those that had "civilized" themselves. In Morrowind, I got the sense that their culture was legitimately different, even incompatible with the morality of the other races. But rather than seeing them as backwards savages, I saw them as a people with hidden depth, who were merely dismissed as savages because they were different. I remember reading that there's a core of gleeful cynicism in nord society that drives their strange behavior. They're a people that believe the world is going to end at any moment (thanks to Alduin). They always think the worst is yet to come. But instead of despairing, they find joy in the aspects of life others fear. It's the reason they love violence, it's the reason they seem so gleeful in the worst of situations. It's the reason they sing songs about war and bloodshed. They're choosing to live their lives freely because they've accepted the inevitability of death. They're seen as brutal savages because they simply don't value life in the same way as others. So imagine my surprise when I get to Skyrim, and find something entirely different. Not a tribal race of semi-nomadic explorers and sailors, living in a brutal land dominated by werebeasts and flying whales, who live in communal long-houses called meadhalls or giant fortress-cities, but a sanitized, "civilized", bland, normal race. They made the nords "safe", and that's my biggest issue. We need to face the facts: Bethesda has no desire to SHOW us any of the interesting stuff they came up with. The people who created that version of Tamriel are long gone, and their replacements don't have the desire or the ability to live up to what they envisioned. So instead, they use the "unreliable narrator" trope as a crutch to retro-actively justify their uninspired, generic worldbuilding. They know that, no matter what, there will be fans out there who will justify their decisions using these exact arguments.
Totally understand your point of view. You point out some serious flaws in Nordic reasoning and logic. Before the Special Edition was released I wished there was a way to side with the Forsworn because I saw this hypocrisy as well. You still cant join the Forsworn, but using the Start Another Life mod you can try to role play that idea as close as possible which sort of vindicates the lack of that option in the vanilla version. When I first played the game 5 years ago, I sided with the Nords because the Imperials tried to kill me, so it was a knee jerk reaction. But as I delved deeper into the story and realized what was going on, I couldnt side with either because they are both violating what we consider human rights. I made many other characters, and usually stayed far away from the Civil War line as I could. While I dont hate the Nords, I certainly cannot connect with them as when I first started the game. And as for the elves, well, they sort of brought this on. Especially the Altmer and their holier than thou approach to the other races of Nirn. I'm definitely interested in Bethesda producing a game after the events of Skyrim take place. I want to see what happened and how they dealt with the many inconsistencies of the races' logic and approaches to peace. Then again, if there wasnt war, we wouldnt have much of a game to be playing I suppose, but good for you pointing it out.
See I'm a ride or die imperial through and through, which is why I focused on the rebellion aspect a bit too much in this video (there's a ton of examples of how annoying nords are I could've picked instead). Imperials have always been very forward thinking to me, working toward a greater good and willing to get themselves dirty to do it (Mede working with Boethiah for example). As stated in Morrowind, "The Empire works through silence and secrecy". The Imperials think decades ahead, and are willing to take a loss that makes them look craven (banning Talos), if it means they can have a long-term victory in the end. They don't care what you think of them, or if you find them cowardly or corrupt (especially the case for Mede and Abnur Tharn). They're concerned with what they perceive as a larger goal toward a greater good. And I think the tragedy of the elves in Skyrim is that they're portrayed in such a one dimensional manner. There's a real reason the elves are the way they are, especially the altmer. When you've been fighting a war on two fronts (sload and maormer) since the dawn of time it stands to reason that you'd become a bit xenophobic. When you've kept to yourself for the majority of history, it stands to reason you'd get fed up at the continued genocide and subjugation of your kin and cousins. The altmer are assholes, but I've always sympathized with them because I like asshole characters, and because I understand where their attitude comes from. From their perspective, mer are the native people of Tamriel and they've been continuously invaded by foreign conquerors who destroy their cities, suppress their culture, and even try to destroy their gods (Maruhk and the dragon break). Comparatively, the mannish races have always been much more expansionistic and prone to create empires than mer, who typically just want to be left alone. The elven races were never happy under the 3rd empire, which was forced upon them by a man they see as a genocidal despot who stole their sovereignty from them. The altmer were actually fine with the second empire, since Reman only asked for taxes and left them alone in most cases. Not only is Talos a symbol of oppression, but he's believed by the elves to be an aspect of the Doom Drum Lorkhan, who is basically their devil figure. The Dominion, from a mer perspective, is a response to what they see as an existential threat to their people from foreign invaders who have never let them live the way they want to live. Now again that's a very biased aldmeri perspective on things, but I'm trying to explain why they are the way they are.
100% fine. I would have liked it if the banit settlements were more traditional nordic, they weren't bandits as much as tribal nords who would regularly ask you to fight them, fist fights and test your sword arm. the cities(village sized towns) were just to barely nordic, not the kind of people who have ice in their veins. :)
if nord traditions in TES matter then the barbarism of the north would have been interesting, as with the incomplete arena at windhelm, such things give a sense of cultural differences between the imps and the nords
Jeffrey wood elves can't eat salads do to the greenpackt they also can't use wood to build or make anything cause of the greenpackt also they are canables
Skyrim was my first elder scrolls game so I really just went into it looking for a fantasy game. The nord was my first character simply because frost resistance and human. I instantly joined the companions and got my impressions off them. In the end, I sided with the stormcloaks and saw nords as honourable people too set in their ways to see anything past their goals. They are prideful and its a double edged sword.
I always got the sense that Nords were the kind to endlessly relive dead glory. They're that one friend that always brings up past events and how fun they were instead of actually doing fun things. I got exactly that in Skyrim. A bunch of people going on and on about how great their city was once, or how much honor some long-dead warrior had, and a bunch of people mistakenly thinking the word "honor" means "to refuse to let go of petty shit" instead of "conduct worthy of respect".
Honor is not rolling over and becoming the Thalmor's bitches, leaving your nord allies high and dry (but that's fine, they're a lesser race anyways), making all the death and destruction in the war mean nothing, and then acting like the Nords are the assholes.
Their Fighters Guild (Companions) is literally a bunch of brain dead Hircine loving lycantropic Daedra worshippers, I can’t imagine what would be a bigger fall from grace for a supposed warrior guild in a warrior culture.
While I understand why you'd be dissapointed in the Nords based on what you were expecting from other games, I came into the series through skyrim and I liked the Nords because I have always been fascinated by ancient Germanic cultures like the Vikings, Anglo Saxons, and continental Germanic tribes and the game portrays the spirit of that culture reasonably well. Basically I was craving an open world "Beowulf" and Skyrim delivers that really well. That is the reason that the Nords are my favorite race.
Basically the same for all the races. Nords are stand-ins for germanics. Imperials are stand-ins for meds. ... the unspoken rule is that the aldmer are jews...
As someone who came into elder scrolls with Skyrim I cannot stand the Nords and was very confused by this weird affection for them. Your explanation of the Old Lore of them certainly makes me understand that interest in them more.
Yeah. I just hope whatever race they tackle next is given more respect. Thanks for watching by the way! Be sure to subscribe and share this video if you haven't already!
Nords were turned into your cookie-cutter modern-day nationalists, instead of the semi-historically inspired viking-ish warriors that wrote warrior sagas and so on. This is a problem with Skyrim's writing in general. For a few rare exceptions - Dark Brotherhood springs to mind - complexity and interesting plot was abandoned and they apparently *wanted* to write everything extremely blandly, dumbing down and so on. The dialogue is usually jarring as fuck and the prose you encounter tends to be mind-numbingly boring (and immersion sucks; as an example the Nord names are mostly uninspired fantasy-garbage that could be replaced by Fantasy Name Generator lists without anybody batting an eye.) I don't know who to blame, but the writers have to take some of it in my books.
The RK The previous Nords were always shown in small doses for the most part. We heard all of this grand viking-esque stuff, but the truth is those Nords we saw were likely just a small percentage of the population. As with real life Norse peoples the vikings were only a job title. Most Norse people weren't vikings. There was no viking culture or anything of the sort. If you were a viking you were someone who went on vikings (i.e. raids). Most Norsemen lived just like the other Europeans of the times with farms, towns, lords, etc. The romanticized version of Norse people we like to think about is just that, a romanticized fantasy. This was probably always the case with the Nords as well. I mean think about this realistically. A civilization that lived the way the Nords were described previously couldn't actually exist, or rather it couldn't function as an actual society. Imagine Morrowind but the only thing you ever saw was the Ashlanders. That'd be Skyrim if they'd kept the previous lore intact. Just a bunch of dudes in longhouses punching shit to death and drinking constantly. You'd also lose any diversity in the world as the original Skyrim was said to be uninhabitable by other races due to the harsh climate. Would you really want to play a game set in a barren, frozen wasteland with nothing but Nords and no opportunity to play as anything but a Nord? For me that'd take away the best part of ES games. Anyway, while I love the more alien and unusual aspects of the ES franchise (Morrowind is still my favorite world they've created) it's stupid to say that Skyrim should've stuck completely to the lore. I wouldn't have minded more variety in the cities, and a few more fantastical creatures and quests would've been awesome, but in the end we never could have had an entire game focused on a bunch of nomads. They had to settle the Nords down. They were never going to be able to be the crazy, Conan the Barbarian inspired dudes we thought they were (well, not all of them anyway).
You have a point, and it's a point I tend to agree with. Still, I think you compensate too much the other way. There was clearly an aspect of romanticizing Vikings in the contemporary Nord culture of the times, the Sagas being just one example of that. A lot of people aspired to become warriors - there was a warrior / honor culture aspect (which shares many traits with warrior cultures across the world) to the Scandinavians at the time. I'm not sure what Bethesda could do to improve the Nords of Skyrim. All I can say is that they felt pretty bland. Maybe if their writing department had done a better job at fleshing out the world of Skyrim in general, the Nords would have felt more authentic, but to me they feel like NPCs with generic Nord hardass accents.
It confuses me why they model a race after a irl people but only use one of the less interesting aspects of them (vague norse houses). None of the raiding, no nomadic people focused in small holds who all go to war together, none of the savagery mixed oddly with strong family bonds.
That's bandit raiding and not Viking raiding. Has nothing to do with the race. You'll find those exact kind of bandits in any fantasy rpg set in an open world. Also, they stick to one hideout and don't move. The only nomads in Skyrim are Khajit, old orcish warriors looking to die, and fucking vampires. Not a goddamn Nord soul among them.
I like how in morrowind and oblivion the nords didn't give a damn about Talos or the other 8 divines and preferred worshipping their own deities (Shor, Alduin, Ysmir etc.) but now suddenly (sarcastic) they care about Talos.
I agree, Skyrim needed more Werebeasts, Meadhalls and Longhouses. There's like 2 Meadhalls I can think of off the top of my head, the one in Whiterun and the one on that Dunmer Island. Come on Bethesda, we need more places to shovel alcohol down our filthy viking throats!
Well I kinda just went with their hypocrisy. I started out as a Nord and played may character really as one of the badass adventuring warriors the nord were once told to be. When I came to the Reach I didn't care for the squabbles and plight the foresworn had to suffer under nordish reign as I was attacked by them without any apparent reason on my first visit there they had dug their own grave. Also I was a god damn Nord and after seeing one of their Hagravens and Thornehearts for the first time my character had his mind made up: this was an evil religion that deserved no place in the lands of the divine Talos himself.
I had the same exact experience, I was roleplaying as a Nord. And I acted like how a Nord would act. Those forsworn guys attacked me and my companion on my way to markarth. I hated them at that point.
the worst problem i had with the game... play an argonian, khajiit or dark elve. There are so many nords that hate these races a lot but they never seem to mention it towards you, if you play like one. The only time where you might get something like this is in combat with people where some of them say stuff like " i make a new pair of scaleboots out of you" or something dumb like that. Khajiit are not allowed into cities but you roam in and out with no consequences whatsoever. Argonian are still kind of seen like slaves or scumb and you almost never see any of them beside being thieves or assassins. Dunmer can walk around in windhelm without problems etc.
Exactly. It's not like RPGs haven't done a better job with this for decades. So why is Skyrim slacking? Thanks for watching by the way! Be sure to subscribe, and share this video if you haven't already!
But then there's no other consequences. Compare this to many, many other RPGs that came out in the last 2 decades. Again, why is Skyrim slacking? You deserve more than a few throwaway lines. You deserve genuine, different experiences each with their own advantages and drawbacks.
Not only experiences but also gameplay changes... Imagine if you play a Khajiit and cannot enter any town, forcing you to gain some reputation and trust first.
Exactly. On the flip side, imagine if you got access to extra quests and huge discounts from the caravans. Players should have benefits and drawbacks based on the way they build their character. This is how RPGs work. Bethesda needs to catch up.
You make some good pints but some just don't really make since to me personally. A) I personally like the Nords being racist hypocrites. Why? Because it makes them more human and show that not everything is sun shine and rainbows. Racism and hypocriraces good in fantasy plots bc it makes them more real in comparison to our own history. Also the Nords are not the worst when it comes to racism, that obviously goes to the high elves who even see their fellow mer as inferior, (Fun fact: High elves are all about Eugenics and actively use selective breeding to try to produce the perfect race.),but all races in Tamerial are racist. Elves generally look down on humans, humans look down on elves and each other. The beast races and the orcs general don't trust any of the other races due to them being isolationist or previous wrongs dond to them. B) The eastern part of the reach as been inhabited by nords since the 1st era Skyrim takes place in the 5th. And the only ones who see the Reachmen religion as "good" are the Reachmen themselves. Like no one likes the Reachmen whether they are Mer, human, or beast. Why because it involves human and animal sacrifice, consorting with demons, and witches/Hagravens as religious leaders. And Reachmen do own property is Skyrim and its those that have converted to the 8/9 divines. Example the village of Karstad(sorry for spelling) the guy who owns the mine is a Reachmen, true a Nord family is trying to force him to sell his mine but that is just cutthroat business dealings. C) As for playing in the Thalmor plans an independent United Skyrim could throw off the elves just like the Redguards did. Though the civil war has weaked Skyrim it could still rebuild. I honestly think the best course for Skyrim independence would have been if Ulfric convinced the High King to declare independence from the empire. Since if you speak to the Court mage in Solitude you learn that the High King idolized Ulfric especially when he gave his speeches on and independent Skyrim. But Ulfric wanted power and now and independent Skyrim is going to have and uphill battle. I see your points but ultimately just disagree with them, but hey to each his own. And sorry for any misspelling.
The problem is not that they are racist. The problem is how the game tries to portray them as the heroes of Skyrim. You never really support anything else but one of the two human factions so who cares about if the some stupid elves are bad or not? The whole game focuses on portraying the Imperals as the bad guys and the Nords as the good guys. Still the nords are the most corrupt, the most racist and the most oppressive. The reality of how how the game portrays the Nords is in conflict with it self. This makes it even more obvious how bad they are with this stark contrast. The game makes you want to like them. At the same time there is nothing to like about them to begin with. Either you accept them for who they are and hates them for it or you try to ignore all the things talking against them being a lovable faction.
I dont think he was saying the racism was the issue, it's that they lost all their interesting aspects outside of being racist and proud lol. All their good and interesting sides were restrained.
@@MegaBanne I for one never felt that the nords, even the damn stormcloaks, were as racist as peoples everywhere seems to suggest You got 2 drunkards in windhelm who insults dunmers refugees. Fair enough, even the goddamn imperials tend to consider themselves above other races To me nords are just isolationistic just like the orcs are and yet nobody blames the orcs for that
@@KalashVodka175 It is not like the orcs decides the faith of Skyrim. They may be bigoted, but they keep away from population centers. They also have strong traditions that does not go well with most other races. They do not let other races move in and then treats them as second rate citizens. Forcing them to be segregated, pay heavy taxes and generally treat them like piss. The argonians are not even allowed to live within the walls of windhelm. This is nothing comparable with the imperials. The orcs is a nomadic people. They have not inherited ancient cities to live in.
I can't say that I particularly "like" the Nords one way or another. But that said, I also can't say I particularly agree with several of your points. Fact is, the Nords are shown as having an adventurous culture, just not everyone follows it. Of course outsiders are going to define the culture by the more extreme examples, in the same way so many other nations see Americans as overweight "gun-toting, prideful, xenophobic, nationalistic". Few Americans are actually like that, and yet, the ones who ARE leave the biggest impact on how our country is viewed. It's the same with the Nords, and thus plenty of adventerers can be found throughout Skyrim. Futhermore, as others have pointed out, not all Nords are shown to be hypocritical in the way you have described. For example, what good is the Markarth example when you remember that Markarth sides with the Empire, not the Stormcloaks? The people of Markarth are much less invested in Talos worship for that reason. I would take it a step more and even say that the Nords are meant to be hypocritical to some degree, as are real-life cultures. Which brings me to my final point. I didn't see any reason to assume the player is meant to "fall in love" with Nord culture. What's your reason for saying that we are? Just because it's set in Skyrim doesn't mean we're supposed to root for them, as your Morrowind example proves. In a game like Skyrim, the player is meant to create their own character and interpret them and put them into the world as they see fit. You are free to side with the Imperials in the Civil War, support the Forsworn during the "Forsworn Conspiracy" quest, wreck general havoc on Nord society. Tl;dr the Nords are adventurous, the hypocrisy is realistic and also not as prevalent as you suggest, and the player is meant to come to their own conclusions.
Actually USA does have the most Overwieght people out of all the countries but the other things you mentioned about USA your correct thats only a small portion
The point in the video was: Before Skyrim in ES lore, Nords were interesting. Now, we go into the game Skyrim: Nords don't live in settlements they were supposed to live in in the lore. There are almost no were-beasts. (few werewolves in base game, and some werebears in dlc, but those, and many others were supposed to be common) Nords don't follow the religion they had in the lore (and as found in different comments here, someone linked an article from development, where nords very much still had their own, unique religion). What nords kept are some of their flaws, but the best, and most unique about them... is gone. The point of the video isn't falling in love with Nords, it's that they are not what they were described as for many years (in the lore in previous games). The concept of their culture being distinct, and in conflict with others is kept, but the culture itself was ripped out of the game (which made for more boring Nords). (similar thing happened to imperials, who used to be based on slightly different culture, had tatoos, and Cyrodiil was a rainforest zone)
If your argument (or lackthereof in your case) involves a personal attack that only makes sense in your alt-right echo-chambers, don't expect anyone with a brain to be offended by it. Thanks for the click.
"Do you like the Nords and think I'm crazy? What are you favorite and least favorite races in fantasy?" For once I'll answer one of these 'let me know in the comments' questions because this one is interesting. Yes, I like the Nords and think you're crazy. Many of the points you made were quite true. The older ideas of the Nords sound *much* more interesting. They were supposed to be Viking Age Scandinavians, and now they are more like high middle-age, early renaissance Scandinavians -slightly burly and unruly fishermen. That said, I don't think they completely failed in the illustration of the 'noble savage' trope which seems to be the intention for the nords. Some of the opinions voiced, however, I really disagree with. Firstly, I don't sympathize with the idea that because Nords are hypocritical they should be denied liberty of their own. You didn't explicitly say that, but that seemed to be in a way a put down of the rebellion, saying that their cause for rebellion was hypocritical. That's not how it works. Think of the English occupation of scotland, where they argued very similar points as you and the imperials, or the American Revolution. Just because a people have some violent and oppressive tendencies, doesn't mean they don't have a right to independence from tyranny, occupation, or oppression. On the same note, I think the religious liberty hypocrisy argument doesn't really make much sense either. What the Nords did to the Reachmen is nothing like what the Aldmeri Dominion and, thus, the empire have done to the Nords because of this one simple reason. Think about how religious liberty works in modern, western society. Would a Reachman be allowed to practice his religion in modern day America? Of course not, the Reachman religion involves human sacrifice, seemingly demon worship, and just general savagery. Religious Liberty doesn't mean freedom to do whatever you want to do religiously, it means protecting people's religion. Granted, sometimes extending the law to allow for certain rituals, but not the the point of human sacrifice or animal cruelty. And the idea that the empire is the better thing for skyrim because the Aldmeri Dominion wants chaos in Skyrim to weaken it has two problems in my eyes. Firstly, Tyranny and occupation from an enemy force is a really bad thing. I don't think you should welcome Tyrannical control just because rebellion may weaken you in a potential conflict with a greater more tyrannical threat. And secondly, the logic there seems to only work with the assumption that the empire is the default, and that the rebellion is the new imposing change, that the civil war is bad for Skyrim, and so we should not have a rebellion and keep the empire. But that's not the case, the rebellion was caused by the empire imposing tyrannical rule on the Nords, a change from the previous system of government. In many ways, the rebellion isn't really all that revolutionary, they are more the traditionalists, the conservatives, keeping the former system and practices against a changing aristocracy. It's plain to see that the civil war is bad for Skyrim, but I see no reason the solution should be doing away with the rebellion. Oh, and I like humans (I can get into why, if you want) and I dislike elves.
*"Firstly, I don't sympathize with the idea that because Nords are hypocritical they should be denied liberty of their own."* I'm not saying that at all. My concern is from a worldbuilding / literary standpoint and not a moral one. Their hypocrisy makes their concerns hard to care about for me. At the very least, if they were as wild and untamed as the lore suggested, then I could respect their bizarre decisions and unruly behavior. It's all about framing. *"What the Nords did to the Reachmen is nothing like what the Aldmeri Dominion and, thus, the empire have done to the Nords because of this one simple reason"* You're right. It's objectively worse. The nords are directly enforcing an entire governmental system on the reachmen, are denying them the right to own land, come up with ridiculous excuses to throw them in jail to work on the mines, and that's not even mentioning their suppression of their religion which is only a small part of the larger issue. We don't know nearly enough about the reachmen's religion to know if it necessitates human sacrifice, or if the forsworn are just extremists driven to the brink. We know next to nothing about the reachmen religion because the nords suppress it entirely as barbarian nonsense. But either way, the nords only claim to the reach is by theft and conquest. This is High Rock land annexed by Skyrim. If conquest justifies dominance, which is a valid if brutish perspective to have, then shouldn't the same standard be applied to the elves who now use the law and brute force to enforce their religious standards? You can't have it both ways without looking like a hypocrite. I can't exactly sympathize with people shouting about religious freedom and sovereingty when their whole society, both historically and in the present, is based on subjugating (reachmen and dunmer) and in some cases committing genocide (snow elves) against entire races. But again, this is less a moral issue for me and more an issue of quality writing. This whole contradiction could have been a brilliant aspect of the larger plot if it has been utilized correctly. If we could engage with the nords on this, really force them to confront this seeming hypocrisy, or at least get a more clear understanding of their perspective, then the writing would've felt more self-aware. Instead it just feels lazy, half-baked, and remains this giant elephant in the room we can never truly address or take sides on (the escape from Cidhna Mine quest doesn't count, since your decision has no baring whatsoever on the game the moment you complete the quest). The rebellion, however you want to look at it, plays right into the Thalmor's hands. Ulfric is doing exactly what the elves want. We can talk about the merits of conservatism, traditional values, or fighting against perceived tyranny, but at the end of the day the elves incited this religious tension in order for the rebellion to happen. They want Tamriel in chaos, divided, and unable to fight them as a cohesive unit. But I could forgive all of this, all of it, if the nords weren't such bores. That's what they were to me. Just a group of whining, hypocritical bores. You made a lot of good points here and I appreciate your input! I hope you keep commenting in the future.
The Nords are actual idiots. They stole Atmora from the Wandering Ehlnofey, stole resources from the Snow Elves, and proceeded to slaughter them just because they fought back. Nords are the reason High Elves hate humanity, as it was a Nordic Empire that used Numidium in the Summerset Isles to force an alliance. It's the Nords fault that the corrupted Falmer occupy Dwemmer ruins. It's the Nords fault that Skyrim is in a state of peril(They didn't realize that the Empire was actually helping to buy time). It's the Nords fault that the Kingdoms of High Rock hate humans. Nords cause the most problems in the TES Multiverse. I side with the Elves.
ChillBroIt'sJustAPrankBro I agree with you for the most part, except on a few details. The Nords did not steal Atmora from the Wandering Ehlnofey, as they are the descended from the Wandering Ehlnofey. The Atmorans, fore-fathers of the Nords, didn't just steal resources from the Falmer. They stole their land slaughtering thousands, forcing the Falmer to seek refuge from the Dwemer who then enslaved them. Numidium was used by Tiber Septim to unite the entire continent. Also High Rock is inhabited by humans, Bretons are one of the human races of Skyrim. So they just hate the Nords. And only the Aldmeri Dominion was pleased with the outlaw of Talos worship, the rebels choose to ignore that.
Sorry, I meant the Ehlnofey that occupied Atmora. Nords are most likely descendants of the Akaviri Humans as there is documentation that says Shor/Lorkhan lead the siege on Atmora in attempt to take it from the Ehlnofey, as Shor is Daedric. The point I was trying to get across is that Stormcloaks/Traditional Nords are barbaric in nature, and tend only to use violence as a way of problem solving, and that because of this, it may be the reason why Elves in the time of Skyrim have a natural disliking of Humanity as a whole.
I see what you're saying. The Mer have a deep seated hatred for mankind, the Nords in particular. But as I love getting into the lore of Nirn, I feel obligated to correct you on a few matters. The Wandering Ehlnofey, the Ehlnofey in which mankind and all non-Mer races are descended from, were scattered outside of Aldmeris (a.k.a. Old Ehlnofey). The Old Ehlnofey, which the Mer are descended from, aren't from Atmora, which I believe you have mixed up with Aldmeris (If I weren't so interested by the lore, I wouldn't care). So Lorkhan (Shor), who is actually Aedric, led siege on Aldmeris (not Atmora), and everybody was Ehlnofey at this point, the difference being those who clung to the old ways, and those who were forced to wander. Nords are descended from Atmorans, and I've never heard of the Akaviri invading Atmora at any point. But the Akaviri did invade Tamriel in the first era. Though the humans of Akavir have since been eaten by the Tsaesci.
@@rememberthefallen1970 they're drunks and dumb, and it's them who historically pushed people around and genocided people, not even the altmer can claim they genocided a race.
There are numerous problems with your analysis of the Nords, and none of the ideas you've presented are original, they've been parroted by every Empire-loving fan of the series who can't seem to get to grips with the rather straightforward notion that the Empire is terribly mis-ruled. Let's start with the Rebellion of Ulfric Stormcloak. Saying that the struggle only plays into the hands of the Aldmeri Dominion and the Thalmor is correct, but overlooks a singular important point: The Empire is the aggressor. Titus Mede II, by signing the White-Gold Concordat, commits the Empire to enforce the Thalmor's Talos Ban, making themselves servants of the Thalmor, and providing safe harbor for their agents to kidnap, murder, and persecute Talos worshipers. The redress that Ulfric seeks is simply to put a stop to this intolerable behaviour. What good is an Empire if it can't protect its people? The second fallacy/distortion is the false equivalence of the Reachmen, whose armed overthrow of Markarth was thrown down by Ulfric. What you fail to acknowledge that the Reachmen aren't just an oppressed under-class, but an oppressed underclass of *Necromantic Daedra-worshipping cannibals*. Did the piles of bloody bones in their lairs not give you a clue? Did the fact that the Briar-heart men are undead pass you by? If the Reachmen wanted only to live in peace with the Nords, then there would be peace, but their goal is the indiscriminate slaughter of all Nords. When they raid caravans and settlements, they don't take prisoners. You can't walk up to a Forsworn camp, unless you go to the one camp where Madenach escaped to, if you side with them in your escape from Cidhna Mine. Everywhere else, you're kill on sight, even if you're a Breton yourself. However, the biggest single fallacy that you're passing off as insight is that you're treating the Nords as if they're a monolith, an obelisk, and they all share the same outlook, virtues, vices, and values. Which really makes *you* the racist. Some Nords are bad, some are good. Some Reachmen are merely downtrodden and oppressed, some are horrendous murderers. What Bethsoft did with Skyrim, and they did a really good job of it, is they fleshed out a *world*, and put an entire panoply of persons in that world, each with their own motivations, perspective, and goals. And yes, some of those people are hypocrites.
How can the guy judge Nords when skyrim is the first time we see there world it's hypocritical they are everything they needed to be in fact skyrim is the coolest province in Tamriel
You're missing the main point of this video though: I just found the nords boring. Regardless of whether you agree with my analysis of them as people, they just felt like imperials with viking helmets to me. I wouldn't have hated them nearly as much if they were presented as the wild, free, rebellious, tribal berserkers that were presented to us in previous games. Imagine a hulking nord wearing nothing but a wolf-pelt in the middle of a frozen wasteland. There's frost forming on his body, but he hardly notices the cold. There's a mead-hall in the distance, surrounded by a settlement that's both a city and a fortress, with fur tents dotting the outskirts. Men and women are fighting drunkenly, laughing and spitting and drinking and singing. Would you expect these people to care if you told them you banned their god? Would you expect anything other than the flaming shouts of their wise-men? The blades of their shield-maidens? It doesn't matter if these people are hypocrites. They clearly don't care. So what if they conquered others? By their very nature they conquer what they see. They are eternal invaders, breathed into the world by Kyne to take what they want. They have no true "home". Skyrim is merely the greatest of their conquests. Does the wind settle in place? Does the wind attach itself to petty notions of treaty and diplomacy? No. The wind blows. It pushes things out of its way to get where it wants, and what it can't push aside it moves around. The nords are living wind. These are the nords presented to us in books like "children of the sky", and previous games. The nords could have retained their flaws and still be interesting, relatable, and enjoyable to engage with.
That's an opinion you can certainly have about the setting, and I can't really rebut it. I'll agree that the Nord fluff definitely sounded a lot cooler in earlier games, however I'm not sure that fluff would have made a very interesting and varied setting. It certainly would have been a far different game, had they chosen to cleave to the earlier version of the Nords as nothing but psycho Vikings living in a monster-infested wasteland. I do feel like you're right in one respect: There needed to be SOME part of Skyrim that was really untamed, and felt that way, to throw the 'civilized' version of the Nords into sharp relief. I'm not convinced that every inch of Skyrim needed to be that way.
I have to disagree with you about the mis-ruled, in Skyrim the Empire looks weak because the Emperor is smart, he knows that the thalmor want him to send more troops there so it weakens the aldmeri border, the Emperor doesn't send troops or Imperial Governors and experince officers except the General because he knows the Elves want the border to be weaker, his family may be corrupt in Skyrim and seen as weak but he is one smart Empire, you can't say it's mis-ruled it's in capable hands but his governors and generals can't act his will out successfully the dragonborn should become the new tiber septim, I believe the dragonborn soul is recycled into different people's bodies, thus you are basically tiber septim this would make the Empire more effective and the nords would swear allegiance to the dragonborn as they should be loyal to those who use the thuum. The Empire should control Skyrim, and should be ruled from a Imperial-Nordic Dragonborn Bloodline.
wait love them i could never understand them, they are extremly racist and biased and belives what suits them the best, ontop of that they are quite stupid. The empire yielding to the thalmor was the obvious choise to avion being completly concured by the thalmor and still having a chance to fight back for talos and ahve a chance against the thalmor and not being pretty much enslaved but many nords refuse to se that and blindy follow the belives of talos ignoring and inconvinace with doing so and starting war with the pepole who are trying to make there pepole survive. How are they likeable. Also there strong hatred for magic does not make it any better even thou there hatred is coming from something that was never magics fault they simply conviently listed it as magics fault and started and hating magic and refuse to listen to any reason about it.
I really preferred them in previous games. I thought they were much cooler, more wild, and generally more interesting. What, exactly, made you like them the most in Skyrim? They just felt like bretons with viking helmets to me.
psychotrip Well, to me they always felt more "cartoonish" in the older games. Big, dumb and with a pretty silly voice. Now that isn't too bad, but they felt alot more badass and "real" in skyrim. But that is just my opinion. ;)
That's 100% fair. I think there's a lot of things later ES games have objectively done "wrong" in recent years, but this is totally a matter of taste and I respect that. See, for me personally, I loved that brief moment of The Elder Scrolls where everything was weird, alien, with crazy magitech and over-the-top races. I get tired of "gritty, realistic" fantasy dominating the market. The Elder Scrolls stood out because it wasn't afraid to go crazy, and yet it remained grounded in very basic, relatable ways. Even though Tamriel was a world with Amazonian, tattoo-covered, greco-byzantine Imperials and north african samurai who can split atoms with their swords, it always came back to basic themes of religion, politics, and human behavior. It was a rare example of the best of both worlds, and it's what made me fall in love with the series in the first place. Most importantly, there was no "normal" race in Tamriel. They all had their own bizarre quirks and behaviors. The nords were part of this weird world. I loved the idea of them being "sophisticated" savages. A race of people that are simultaneously romanticized and reviled. You especially saw this in Oblivion, where it felt like there was a lot of racism against the nords, even those that had "civilized" themselves. In Morrowind, I got the sense that their culture was legitimately different, even incompatible with the morality of the other races. But rather than seeing them as backwards savages, I saw them as a people with hidden depth, who were merely dismissed as savages because they were different. I remember reading that there's a core of gleeful cynicism in nord society that drives their strange behavior. They're a people that believe the world is going to end at any moment (thanks to Alduin). They always think the worst is yet to come. But instead of despairing, they find joy in the aspects of life others fear. It's the reason they love violence, it's the reason they seem so gleeful in the worst of situations. It's the reason they sing songs about war and bloodshed. They're choosing to live their lives freely because they've accepted the inevitability of death. They're seen as brutal savages because they simply don't value life in the same way as others. So imagine my surprise when I get to Skyrim, and find something entirely different. Not a tribal race of semi-nomadic explorers and sailors, living in a brutal land dominated by werebeasts and flying whales, who live in communal long-houses called meadhalls or giant fortress-cities, but a sanitized, "civilized", bland, normal race. They made the nords "safe", and that's my biggest issue. So, I understand your point of view, but can you also see how disappointing this would be for someone who enjoyed the strange "cartooniness" of previous games?
Oh got that comment wrong! I mean't the Forsworn weren't the first ones in The Reach but it was the Needs because there are Nordic Ruins and they were in High Rock and Skyrim first before the Aldmeri came and interbred with the Needs.
No problem, and nordic ruins vary in age, all the way up the first era if I remember correctly. The nedic people didn't just become nords either, many of them became the modern day bretons and imperials. Either way, between the reachmen and the nords, the reachmen were there first.
There's actually evidence of human habitation in High Rock long before the nords arrived. The people who would become the bretons lived there long before the people who would become the nords. By the time the nords began exploring the high rock area, these people were already around. As I recall, The nords even attacked them initially because they thought they might be elves
Something happened between 2008 and 2012 at either Bethesda or Zenimax, or maybe both, that had this effect on all of their games during this period. And it still lingers. I feel like the same circumstances that lead to Nords being "white-washed", lead to ESO being released as a roller-coaster with 60's era animatronics for NPCs. tl;dr Bethesda was ordered to stop baking Delicious Pie, and given a metric ton of market driven Cake mix.
I agree with the essence of your statement almost completely, but I will always disagree that watering down a game's world makes it more market friendly. It's a common assumption, but I've never seen any convincing evidence of this. The market just wants an enjoyable experience, regardless of how weird the world is.
Why 2008? While Oblivion had fun and creative quests, the setting and the world itself was probably one of the most boring, unimaginative and generic fantasy realms I have ever seen.
Agreed completely. Oblivion is both my favorite and least favorite Elder Scrolls game, but to this day I've played my (heavily) modded version of it more than any other game I own.
The real sad part is if you read earlier lore than Cyrodiil should be very interesting pitch of Land. What happened in Oblivion was probably the success of the LotR Movies. Much of the designs looked very inspired by the Movie designs.
The funny thing from my end as someone who got into the series with Oblivion, the Nords have always been a bit bland. Sure they've always been a bit wild, but other than that they were almost as lacking in really deep flavour as the Imperials (even the Bretons had some really cool shit carry over from Daggerfall). Then I started getting into the lore and learned that it was only the Colovian Imperials that were boring, but Bethesda seemed allergic to giving the Nibenaeans any proper development, and that general state of feeling carried well into Skyrim. Around this time I started to get into the more insane Kirkbridian lore, and properly understand what that lore meant in context. And the Nords were still boring to the point that where once I just always wanted to play other races more and never really got around to making Nords, I actively refused to play them in Skyrim. And then I started finding all the Nord lore that was written for Skyrim but was cut ("gutted" according to Kirkbride) from the finished product. The Seven Fights of the Aldudagga, The 500 Mighty Companions of Ysgramor the Returned, Shor Son of Shor, and the big whammy, a portion of a design document on modern Nord totem religion. And suddenly I love the Nords. The very existence of these texts gives me a perspective on the perspective of the descendants of the Wandering Ehlnofey in general, and the Nords in particular, that has made me appreciate the entire series more. My point, I guess, is that not only did Bethesda fuck up, the original plan was good and then part-way through implementation they fucked it up, leaving just enough of their original intent behind to see it, now that we know what to look for given access to these texts. Now when I bother to pick up the controller, I can play Skyrim and appreciate it, not as it is, but as a map through which my imagination can take me to these fascinating places. It's very bittersweet experience, so I don't indulge often, even as I become more active in the lore community.
The thing that always hit me the most was when one of the Jarls I think said that 99% of the people in Skyrim still worshipped Talos and it was flying under the Aldemeri radar because no one reported it or anything because they all still worshipped him. Ulfric then went and started the rebellion, which actually drew attention to the issue, and forced crackdowns on worship and the civil war. That's the main reason I always side with the Empire - Ulfric is just making trouble where there is none so he can be high king.
Yea Ulfric is an ass and a glory seeker attention whore and a murderer. Its better to side with the Empire too because if you actually talk to General Tulius and everyone, they are biding their time and playing the long game against the Thalmor in the plans of eventually going to war with them again and destroying them. Losing Skyrim and the Nords would hurt that.
Ulfric refuses to take the crown until the Jarls all hold a moot and appoint him, should they still choose to do so. "Ulfric just wants the crown" is Imperial propaganda. The Empire is working for the Thalmor, kidnapping and torturing their own citizens in fear of the elves. What gives them the right to tell the people of Skyrim what not to worship? Especially because they're wrong about Talos. A united Skyrim is the best option; every city flying a blue banner, and the true sons and daughters of Skyrim standing together to kick the usurpers out of Skyrim with the Dragonborn leading the charge wielding Wuuthrad.
I can never in good (roleplaying) conscience side with the empire. Certainly not when playing a nord. The empire tried to execute you for no reason, despite Hadvar's reasoning, and they rolled over to the Thalmor. Siding with the Empire is basically a cuck playthrough.
I feel like the Nords are more "incomplete" than "flawed beyond redemption". They had their flaws, sure, but so did literally every other race in the game. Without them, we'd never play because of how bland the game would become. This may be more of an unpopular opinion, but I have almost always sided with the Stormcloaks over the Imperials because of the following logic: either side with the Blue Guys, freedom fighters who were occasionally racist and hypocritical but were just generally trying to keep their homeland from the invaders; or side with the Red Guys, almost-tyrannical imperialists (both in name and in ideology) who were being influenced to war by their allies, who - need I remind you - _were going to execute you in the beginning of the game_ for literally no other reason than, "Oh, you're not on our list of known Blue Guys? Eh, we'll cut your head off anyways. Sorry for the inconvenience."
The Nords modernized as any society would. The Vikings did and later the Normans did. And as to racism? Ulfric isnt a racist he is a nationalist. The Empire is dead and Talos would be ashamed of it. That said I no longer support either faction and think that the war would be bad for tamriel but I still hope they keep Ulfric alive in the next TES even if the stormcloaks losing is canon
Normans were practically Latinized Vikings. They were Vikings who settled down and accepted the Germanic/Latin/Catholic lifestyle of the peoples they were warring against for centuries. Then they became hitmen for the Pope in Italy and rulers in England.
Talos wants his empire to die. He states this in Morrowind when you meet him. Then in the Bloodmoon, the Skaal prophesied that the Septim bloodline will end and that the Empire will die when the Dragon dies
@@thebk247 That empire is already dead. A new empire needs to simply use the old empire's corpse as fertilizer. While I don't believe that the emperor needs to be Dragonborn, he should at least be a Shezarrine (Lorkhan is lord, master, and creator of humanity). Currently, the Medes are none of these things.
I think, that I could see the nords as I imagined, if there were also nord tribes having problems with the big citys, because they abandoned the way of their ancestors
HolyknightVader999 look what i mean is, that we should have more nord tibes like strongholds, with quests, or even a third faction, wich is against the empire and the stormcloaks
Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought the whole point of the Nords fighting the Empire was because the Empire bent over backwards to appease the elves? After the Great War, the Empire pretty much did everything they asked and still continue to do so. I was under the impression that the Nords no longer want to be ruled by the empire, because the empire is essentially siding with the Aldmeri Dominion. They'd rather be independent.
This is only the case if you know nothing about the Imperials in The Elder Scrolls. The Imperials are a lot of things, but most of all they're devious and politically sneaky. As stated in Morrowind, "The Empire works through silence and secrecy". In short, the Empire is PRETENDING to bend over bakcwards for the Dominion, but they're actively planning to go back to war with them. Since we've never seen the world from the perspective of the Dominion (outside of ESO), we have no idea what the other side of the treaty is like, or if the Imperials are actively sabatoguing the Dominion in the same way the Thalmor are doing to The Empire. The Stormcloaks, on the other hand, are being directly manipulated by the Thalmor. The Thalmor didn't even enforce the ban on Talos worship until The Markarth Incident, which was orchestrated by the Thalmor when they brainwashed Ulfric. He's since broken free from their direct influence, but the Thalmor are the ultimate reason for this rebellion. They WANT this war to happen and to go on as long as possible. Read the Thalmor Dossier on Ulfric or "The Bear Of Markarth" for more information. Because, think about it: how the hell is Skyrim going to take on the entire Dominion by itself? Hammerfell could barely fend them off and they have the greatest warriors in the world, and the second greatest navy. The Thalmor want to divide and conquer. Ulfric is playing into their hands. The Empire is playing the long-game.
@@psychotripnerdstuff Redguards and Nords are both great fighters, just in different ways. See. When people want to bring in RL politics in ES, they usually go for some racial bullshit. Me? I see the Empire as one that tells its people that they will fulfill their promises "eventually". And "eventually" that either never comes or only comes due to external influence. If it takes the Stormcloaks to force the Empire to hurry it up or die, so be it.
This is nonsense. The Nords are interesting precisely because the nord "image" doesn't sync up with reality as you experience it. It doesn't beat you over the head with, it doesn't give you too many nods, so you definitely get it. It's intentional and it's present enough so that it makes me think twice about everything that happens in Skyrim, and examine it in a larger context.
Except the reality as I experienced it was boring and agitating. I think you're giving the writers the benefit of the doubt here when I don't think they've earned it. It would be one thing if the writing felt self-aware, if the player was capable of calling out the nords on their bullshit, or if the game just acknowledged it more. It would be one thing if the nords were remarkable or interesting in any way compared to the other human races, but honestly I just found them to be annoying bores. Intentional or no, the end result is a race I just don't like anymore, and yet the game is shoving this idea of their heroism and honor down my throat.
There wasn't a whole lot to examine though. It was sooo vanilla fantasy. I understand how the lore from Morrowind could just be Dunmeri propaganda, but the nords in Skyrim were just not interesting. They were like Vikings, but without much of the stuff that actually made Vikings interesting in the first place.
The reason for the war is ALOT more complicated then that. Talos mantled Lorkhan, the trickster god that made the world of Tamriel possible, and Lorkhan is the god that removed the high elves power and made them mortal like everyone else. If the worship of Talos diminishes it means that the High elves have a chance to regain their godhood, meaning extermination of all men. The Empire is weak, and accepting the demands of the high elves was a fatal mistake, the alternative is far worst than centuries of wars.
Hustling Days You didn't watch the video did ya? He says right at the beginning he enjoys the back story and lore and doesn't get why they decided to ignore all that and make the race boring in the acrual game
The worship of Talos was doing fine until Ulfric started his rebellion, Alvor from Riverwood says this - everyone had their own private Talos shrine before the Stormcloaks' uprising. And even at the time of the TES5 - look at Whiterun, there is a statue of Talos right in the middle of the city which is aligned itself with the Empire. So Thalmor's war against Talos isn't that effective. The civil war benefits nobody else but Thalmor - humans reproduction rates are much higher than the ones of Altmer, so give the mankind 40 years of peace - and the casualties of the Great War will be completely replenished by the new generations and the Empire can have the second round. Ulfric started his rebellion in the interests of Thalmor, he being an "asset" according to his dossier isn't just a figure of speech.
@@OlegLecinsky I think you're missing the point: both sides are feckin'wrong. Either way, whoever wins, the thalmor win. They banned Talos because he is the protector of man. Rid him out of the picture and you can easily eliminate the entire race without problems from a particular God. Even if the civil war hadn't start, the Thalmor would have won either way. The truth is the empire of Cyordiil should of died out a long time ago after the first elder scrolls game, because after that it grew corrupt and became a shadow of it's former self. Even Talos agrees on this because you can talk to him in Morrowind saying, "Yeah, the empire should be outright replaced." Not kill them off but replace the order of their form of government.
I'd say once you see everything and read everything in the game, it's clear that the Nords are meant to be portrayed as racist, isolationist warmongerers whom only find peace after dying in battle. Their leader shouted a weaker, younger man to death just because he felt entitled to the entire fucking region of Skyrim. Some npcs are outspoken in saying Ulfric just wants power and doesnt care about Talos. The devs had plenty of voicings against the Nords. You could side with the damn empire and see Ulfric wasnt even willing to negotiate when presented with fair terms, then you could murder him and make him look like a bitch whilst doin it. Not to mention the many dark elf racism encounters....the only people who like the Nords are...the Nords..and i wonder why theres alot of Nords in the game who support their cause, along with quests with that tone...because oh idk..THE GAME IS BASED IN THEIR HOMELAND. Your point about the devs forcing you to like the Nords was......?
Then you haven't read quite everything. The Nords are people who suffered and decided to stop suffering by making everyone else fear them. Their God was murdered for daring to create the World. Their settlement on Skyrim was slaughtered by Snow Elves because they uncovered an ancient, powerful artifact, and decided to keep it hidden. They were oppressed for centuries by the Dragons, and had to fight to be free. After all that, they spread down south, and found fellow humans in trouble, and they helped them. They lost their greatest hero, Ysmir, too soon, and later failed to bring back their God. After all that, the fact that they were willing to live in peace in an Empire, is admirable.
i gotta disagree with this. i'm team empire all the way and after literally DOZENS of consequent playthroughs, i never once felt like the game favored one side over the other. the game presented each side of the war as two opposing ideologies that fought for what they believed in. yeah, they both had their flaws and the game blatantly points them out if you're paying attention but there was never a clear cut bad guy between the two, nor should there be. war is far more nuanced than your typical rpg, where the bad guys wear menacing black armor covered in the skulls of dead babies. furthermore, it's most certainly possible to sympathize with ethno-nationalists. i may not agree with the outlook but the nord identity was most certainly under siege and when an identity falls under siege, members of that demographic tend to coagulate. it's happened time and time again and i can be sympathetic to such a cause, even if i don't agree with its goals.
If you sympathize with ethno nationalists, you ARE an ethno nationalist. I feel no sympathy for xenophobic cry bullies who want to commit genocide for the sake of national sovereignty. Death the Stormcloaks.
Sounds a lot like the Oblivion Issue. We hear about a larg and rich empire formed by two peoples joining together to overthrow their enslaving oppressors. The land is a jungle with lots of wildlife and rich flora, yet in this wilderness they carved out the dominant power in Tamriel. This was Cyrodil. Then Oblivion was released.
I'm pretty sure they were toned down on purpose. I'm pro empire all the way, but I think the whole point of ulfric was to show that the empire had weakened the nordic culture as well as the nords themselves. If you look back at their ancestors; (The Atmorans), the atmorans were easily the most powerful race to ever exist. Even the giants were dwarfed by there strength. Ysgramor easily wrestled a giant chief Sinmur with ease, then took his giant wives as a reward. The nord were purposely made to be shadows of there former selves in order to further enforce the idea that the empire has weekend the nords. That's why ulfric says nords drink the milf from the false empire. However ulfric is still a milk drinker himself since he wants to worship and imperial God talos. Tiber septim was a breton names Hjalti Earlybeard, and he took credit for many of Ysmir Wulfarth's feats. In reality if the nords want to return to their former glory, they need to outlaw the imperial pantheon and start worshipping the nordic pantheon just like Wulfarth did.
It's so sad that such a cool race got such an underwhelming feeling within Skyrim. Skyrim itself is a wonderful game, its just that it could be EVEN better if they were to start sticking more into the roots with the lore of the province and the people that live there. The bandits are laughable without mods, the nords cry and squabble like the Bretons of High Rock and worst of all, as stated in this video, the Stormcloaks from the start to finish are generally painted as the "good" guys when evidence CLEARLY points to this being false. They're noble in their cause, however they fight the wrong fight.
I can't agree less with your argument against the Stormcloaks. The game has a fair representation of both. The game lets you form your own opinion on the warring sides. You seem to think it is cut and dry, however both sides have positives and both have negatives. At the time of Skyrim the Empire is crumbling. It used to rule all Tamerial. Now the Aldmeri control the south, Hammerfell has rebelled, Morrowwind is in chaos and Blackmarsh is inhospitable. From the point of view of Ulfric, come the next war the Empire will lose. As for the racism talked about in the video. Nords have always been a little xenophobic, it is not a massive issue for most races, but in game you will see a special dislike for elves. After a large war the reason is pretty obvious, but they seem to harbour more hatred for Dark elves. Looking back through the lore this becomes much more understandable. Dark elves are disliked by everyone. They worship the deadra, they practice slavery and the biggest issue for the Nords, they destroyed the heart of Lorkhan. Lorkhan for the Nords is Shor. You may have noticed he is quite important to them. The imperials have their arguments too. They say that whatever Ulfric claims, the main reason for his rebellion is greed for power. They argue that dividing the empire further will surely result in its defeat and Aldmeri will conquer all Tamriel. To sum up, I believe the game gives equal representation of both sides and there is not clear right and wrong. As for your other point, I would say that it maybe due to the limitations at the time.
Stormcloaks are never really painted as the "good guys", they are very well contrated to the Imperials. Imperials for one have a tyrannical occupation of skyrim. Yes, the Stormcloaks do fight for some noble goals, but you can see it in Ulfric, which is the leader of the rebellion, but he himself is constantly questioned to whether he really wants to free Skyrim or just have power.
No race or faction is good in Skyrim but you could argue that the imperials aren’t that bad. The Aldemeri Dominion wants the Nords to beat the empire. The Nords alone cannot beat the whole of the dominion and General Tullius understood this. The empire was in rebuild mode from the previous war so their strat was to work with the dominion until the dominion gives them a reason to go to war again. The empire winning skyrim would gain them the nords as allies, the empire losing skyrim only effectively makes every faction weaker to the dominion.
You could Argue the Nords are right though for rebelling as it was their land in the first place and both the empire and the dominion are tresspassing onto their land and stealing it. It’s completely understandable that the Nords are pissed off and they can’t even worship Talos under the Dominion. The only thing holding the Nords back is they don’t give a shit about fighting for anything other than skyrim and about half of them hate other races because they want to be isolated on their land.
While it never dawned on me how bad the Nords where, even before then I was an Imperial Sympathizer because...really and truly the Civil War was stupid... Even without the hypocrisy it was clear that the Empire only signed that treaty to buy themselves some time. Honestly why else would a nation ban the STATE RELIGION? They wanted time and so did the elves. And if if the rebellion succeeded, then what? The Empire, weakened as it would be, would most likely be conquered by the elves and Skyrim would follow soon after. Even if Ulfric wasn't an Altmeri puppet, what is one little province going to do against the power that conquered the damn continent? In the long run, once the Empire was sure of its strength again, it would pissed on the treaty, because it did nothing but made them look weak. Talos worship would return and such, and in the meantime, all people had to do was not mention his name when the damn high elves were nearby. The sad irony is, despite the xenophobia of the Nords, their petty war was only going to help the very race they hated and no one else.
the AD use spies and the like in proxy wars, not all out war as they are very few in number also it's near impossible use anything but brute force on the nords
The Nords are right in defending their land from the Thalmor. What is left of the Empire is not what it used to be and are now just puppets of the Aldmeri Dominion, kidnapping and torturing their own people in fear of it being done to them. The Stormcloaks know that only fighting back will help them; "with our blood and our steel we will take back our home." The elves are racist assholes who need to be put in their place and will be one Ulfric unites Skyrim.
ChillBroIt'sJustAPrankBro Congratulations, you don't know the lore at all. The Nords took on the cyrodillic pantheon the moment they bowed down to Talos. Now the Dominion bans the worship of the person they followed (to the point where they took on Talos's imperial pantheon). And the Nords still worship the old pantheon. There's Shor, Kyne and etc. Just different names.
No. Rebels would not worship the untraditional gods that the Imperials worship, especially if they wanted to show true independence. And I never knew the Nords worshipped Akatosh(They didn't, or ever did), or that the Imperials worship Alduin...? Or that they interpret the gods in the same way the Empire does(which is a completely retarded thing to say especially considering the Nordic lifestyle). No. The Gods are not the same. Look up the Nordic Pantheon and see what the Gods represent. And if you really wanna bring up Shor and Kyne, how many times do you see them in the game, besides in a few side quests? The Nords of Tamriel are clearly based on the Nords of the Dark Ages, who named days of the week after their gods, and held them as close, if not closer than family. And I want to see some proof of this idea you have that Nords follow the same religion as the Empire because of Talos, because, you know, people aren't free-thinkers apparently.
I know, right? All they had to do was switch the bandits out for wandering nomadic nord raiders or something. A tiny change that would've added a lot of flavor.
It could have been treated like a smaller version of the civil war, where if you befriend one tribe you automatically make enemies with another. Or instead of becoming a Thane, doing quests could make you an honorary member of a tribe, and give you the ability to roam their territory without being attacked on sight.
While I agree that Skyrim made the nords boring, the markarth incident didn't go down like that. The empire first conquered the reach back in the first era before and it was it's own kingdom not apart of high rock. The foresworn however refused to surrender so the empire gave the land to the nords, they have been at a state of war ever since. During the great war the foresworn captured markarth and declared the reach an independent kingdom. Because of the war the empire couldn't send troops to reclaim it. After the war they were still recovering so the emperor made a deal with ulfeic stormcloak in which if ulfric gathered an army of nords warriors and reclaimed markarth, then the nords could worship talos, directly violating the empires treaty with the aldmeri dominion. Ulfric gathered the army and captured markarth and in return the emperor allowed him to worship talos. However the thalmor found out about this agreement and put their foot down, they demanded to be able to send troops into Skyrim to hunt down talos worshipers. or it would mean another war. Since the emperor is a little bitch he let the thalmor into Skyrim. That is what started ulfric rebellion, next time do some proper research.
Yeah, they’ll regret that once the Thalmor have a large enough occupation for a coup of Skyrim. The Thalmor were going to come to Skyrim regardless of the Markarth incident. Skyrim i practically impossible to invade and what better way to invade via the WGC and overthrow it like they did in Valenwood.
I love the wood elves so much. My character is mostly neutral, so she doesn't pick a side for the civil war. I used alternate start so that I could establish my character and give her a “normal” life before starting the main quest line. I usually go for being the master thief and/or assassin so that my character eventually becomes a reluctant hero. This way my characters aren't just thrown into their destiny. They have to find it themselves.
Very true. I'm not saying these differences don't make sense or are contradictions in and of themselves. My issue is that Bethesda chose to change the nords in this way. Any reasoning behind it may be valid within the game world, but didn't have to happen.
Serithi Thing is the Nordic pantheon had been around for thousands of years. I'm not saying it couldn't happen but to me it doesn't seem as likely. Either way imo if the old Nordic Pantheon was still well established in the time of Skyrim I think it would have made the Nords way more interesting and also distinct from the Imperials. Fudgemuppet has a great video on this!
Yeah, I think that in the course of weaving the civil war into the story, they ended up making the nords act like petty bitches instead of proud warriors. They shouldn't have bothered so much with the aldmeri dominion vs empire vs nords shit, and paid more mind to the main story- which was a perfect conductor for nord characters.
I think a better writer could've balanced the two stories well without sacrificing the nord's character. I should also note that Skyrim had no dedicated writers. As I recall, it was all developers who had different primary jobs just stringing stuff together on the side. Thanks for watching, by the way! be sure to subscribe, and share this video if you haven't already!
Oh, I have no doubt a good writer could have done both, you're right about that. Just that given how the game was developed (as you mentioned, without dedicated writers), they could have done a better job if they'd focused more in the same direction. The civil war as it is just feels... inconsequential, while the main story at least has some steam, once it gets moving.
It really does. There's so little consequence or acknowledgement of the events or outcome of the war. The fact that no high king / queen is ever crowned is just a slap in the face.
It is so very relevant that the lore of Tamriel is delivered to us via in-universe books and dialogue. That's why it surprises me every time someone comes along and says "they did this wrong" or "I guess they retconned this", when the source of information they're using was deliberately written to be hyperbole or hearsay. The Pocket Guide to the Empire is a perfect example of this. What's more likely, that it's meant to be factual or that it's meant to demonstrate imperial propaganda and supremacy? Don't take the in-game books at face value. Much like our world's own historical records and various articles, they're written by flawed minds biased by an agenda of some sort. The only way to see what's real is to witness it personally.
To those making the argument that previous descriptions of nords were merely "exaggerations" or the result of "unreliable narrators": I hear you, I understand this argument, but hear me out for a moment... *Yes, the Elder Scrolls is full of conflicting accounts. Yes, most descriptions are made by in-game sources which can be flawed. Yes, it makes TOTAL sense for previous descriptions and previous examples of Nords to be more fantastical than "reality". You can totally explain things that way. But this begs the question...* Why does Bethesda keep resorting to this trope? Since Oblivion, it seems that every time we finally see something they've built up in a crazy, creative, and high-fantasy manner, it ends up being far more mundane and "normal" than we expected it to be. Why does Bethesda always seem to choose the most boring interpretation of everything they've created? Sure, in real life different cultures often get exaggerated and distorted by stereotypes and hearsay. But for Bethesda, it feels more like a crutch at this point. Think about it: Imperials went from tattoo-covered, greco-byzantine amazonian aristocrats following thousands of different religions living in a gargantuan metropolis surrounded by endless jungle...to generic quasi-Romans living in Middle Earth. Altmer went from math-obsessed, magitech nazi-elves living in a dark paradise with skyscrappers made of glass and cities made of coral, to generic high elves living in gray, boring "Rivendell" buildings. See, for me personally, I loved that brief moment of The Elder Scrolls (Between Redguard and Morrowind) where everything was weird, alien, with crazy magitech and over-the-top races. Morrowind was never supposed to be the only "weird" part of Tamriel. There was a time when it was all weird in its own way. I get tired of "gritty, realistic" fantasy dominating the market. The Elder Scrolls stood out because it wasn't afraid to go crazy, and yet it remained grounded in very basic, relatable ways. The nords were part of this weird world. I loved the idea of them being "sophisticated" savages. A race of people that are simultaneously romanticized and reviled. You especially saw this in Oblivion, where it felt like there was a lot of racism against the nords, even those that had "civilized" themselves. In Morrowind, I got the sense that their culture was legitimately different, even incompatible with the morality of the other races. But rather than seeing them as backwards savages, I saw them as a people with hidden depth, who were merely dismissed as savages because they were different. I remember reading that there's a core of gleeful cynicism in nord society that drives their strange behavior. They're a people that believe the world is going to end at any moment (thanks to Alduin). They always think the worst is yet to come. But instead of despairing, they find joy in the aspects of life others fear. It's the reason they love violence, it's the reason they seem so gleeful in the worst of situations. It's the reason they sing songs about war and bloodshed. They're choosing to live their lives freely because they've accepted the inevitability of death. They're seen as brutal savages because they simply don't value life in the same way as others. So imagine my surprise when I get to Skyrim, and find something entirely different. Not a tribal race of semi-nomadic explorers and sailors, living in a brutal land dominated by werebeasts and flying whales, who live in communal long-houses called meadhalls or giant fortress-cities, but a sanitized, "civilized", bland, normal race. They made the nords "safe", and that's my biggest issue. We need to face the facts: Bethesda has no desire to SHOW us any of the interesting stuff they came up with. The people who created that version of Tamriel are long gone, and their replacements don't have the desire or the ability to live up to what they envisioned. So instead, they use the "unreliable narrator" trope as a crutch to retro-actively justify their uninspired, generic worldbuilding. They know that, no matter what, there will be fans out there who will justify their decisions using these exact arguments. The bottom line is the developers choose what's true and what's not. My argument is that their choices are boring, uninspired, and derivative of other fantasy worlds.
Read up on the effect of Puritanism on American culture. Nobody believes they're the villain in their own narrative. 25 years after the Great War, the population of Skyrim would have been set back generations, and the greatest heroes and most capable men and women of the war generation would have been lost to that war - the remainder would be bitter and impoverished, and insult added to injury, forbidden to acknowledge their greatest hero. All perfectly understandable, and derivative of corollaries in our own recent history (see: Post WW2 Soviet Union). Your description of their earlier lore made them sound like Cimmerians, which would have been an interesting take on the culture, indeed. Too bad that's not the game we got, but given the above, understandable and accurate, imo.
Yeah. Bethesda really messed up the Nords in Skyrim. They were nothing like they were in past games. This is why I am very afraid of Elder Scrolls VI, or one of the many reasons anyway. This is also a reason I kind of do not want a game set in Argonia because I know Bethesda could never do the Argonians the justice they deserve.
I agree, but not just Argonia. No Akavir and No Elweyr either. Bethesda/Zenimax would ruin all of those places. I hope they pick somewhere (relatively) boring like High Rock, or maybe just make every single sequel be in Cyrodiil but in different time periods. That would keep the smashing of lore to a minimum.
ShadowSpike Orsinium is only one very large city. Wouldn't work as a full game. We only really saw half of High Rock and part of Hammerfell in Daggerfall though so I honestly think High Rock would be a safe bet. They could show the parts we didn't see, and lets be honest Daggerfall looked awful so even the parts we have seen would look completely new. My money's either on High Rock or Hammerfell for ES6. Valenwood is also a possibility, but I'd put it behind the other two in terms of likelihood.
You are lumping all the Nords in with Ulfric's rebellion. There were plenty of Nord members of the Imperial army. Your comparisons are similar to thinking all Americans are racists just because of a vocal population in the south.
Except I explicitly mention the hypocrisy of the Imperial side as well. I placed a lot of emphasis on the rebellion because the game places so much emphasis on it. It's a constant subplot and yet its built on such a shaky foundation.
Not really. The Stormcloaks have every right to deny their oppressors and fight back against injustice; it's their duty, even. The Thalmor are evil - no one who has played the game denies this - yet so many people express their belief that the rebellion is wrong, pointless, or detrimental to Skyrim and its people. The Empire _used_ to stand for something; it used to represent a united people and it _was_ beneficial. As of Skyrim (the game), the Empire is not what it once was and is now just a puppet of the Aldmeri Dominion, enforcing the will of the Thalmor against the people of Skyrim; kidnapping, torturing, murdering, etc. The Empire we see in Skyrim is a shadow of its former self and the Stormcloaks _are_ the true sons and daughters of Skyrim. The game is just built so as to confuse you until you've played enough of it to see which side is right. As for the Markarth incident, you need to do more research.
Hans Ollo is right, I think. The Empire is meant to be a shell of its former self and the civil war in Skyrim is meant to be a demonstration of the internal chaos that exists when something like the Empire fails. Yes, the rebellion plays into the Thalmor's hands, but the whole point of the quest where the Dragonborn finds out about their secret plan is that nobody else knows that that is what they want...and I don't care who you are, no player knew that either until they found those documents in the game. The Markarth Incident is a little more complicated than you implied and you should familiarize yourself more with the history of it, but I see the Nords' and Empire's position in the Reach as similar to the United States' position concerning native tribes and reservations. Yes, it is completely hypocritcal when you compare it to the central ethical message that is broadcast by the culture, but don't you think that makes Skyrim more believable and real? I mean, in the real world, Germans aren't all stuck up bureaucratic jerks, Japanese people aren't all robotically perfect at everything they do, and not every American is a gun-toting look-at-me-I'm-so-great patriot. Cultures and societies are a complex tapestry of different people with different thoughts and opinions and ideals and nobody is ever perfect. I think that's part of the brilliance of the Elder Scrolls races. They aren't perfect and they don't fit a uniform identity, despite the prevalence of racist stereotypes and uneven characterizations that others make of them. So, yes, Nords are kind of hypocritical jerks and they are kind of oblivious about it, but welcome to the human race. I think it's infinitely more interesting that they replicate true humanity in this way than simply having a race of wild Northern horned-helmeted brutes who all fit this perfect stereotype of idealized noble savage warriors... EDIT: all that being said, I was never all that interested in the Nords, anyway. I mean, it was cool getting a first-hand look at their homeland, but there wasn't much interest for me to have lost to begin with. I'm still just waiting patiently for a better view of the Summerset Isles or Elseweyr or Valenwood. Hammerfell would be cool, too.
Being honest if i wouldn't like people talos or ysgramor being human or elf considering Ysgramor is famous for essentially comitting genocide on the snow elves and talos tried to take over the world.
I'll post something I posted on a Skyrim community on G+ here. I imagine that a lot of people here think the Stormcloaks are right. But maybe I'll give you a perspective you hadn't considered. The biggest contention the Stormcloaks have with the Empire is bending the knee to the Thalmor and outlawing worship of Talos. The problem is, this shouldn't have even been an issue for the Nords at all. Talos is an Imperial god, worshiped in Cyrodiil with smaller cults elsewhere(like in Morrowind, for example). He has a counterpart in the Nordic pantheon, called Ysmir. Yes, the one the bandits shout about. Ysmir is part of who would become Talos, though in origin is a different entity who was very much against the Imperial gods. He himself was known as Wulfharth, and was elected High King after his predecessor's death. His Thu'um was so powerful, he couldn't verbally take the oath of office without injuring everyone in the vicinity. Immediately after his oath was sworn, he had his scribes write a decree: that worship of all Imperial gods was forbidden in Skyrim, and that the Nordic pantheon was reinstated. He was so set on removing the Imperial religion from Skyrim that he had temples burned to ashes and priests burned at the stake. He was called Ysmir, Dragon of the North, by the Imperials for not only his heresy, but his wrath. His wrath continued, forcing the Orcs out of the eastern portion of Skyrim. He himself fought, and when he found the chief of the Orcs he shouted him apart so soundly the Orc chief's body ended up in Oblivion. But he wasn't all fury. He swallowed a thundercloud, using its heat to keep his troops warm. For this they called him the Breath of Kyne, another Nordic goddess. Another Nordic god, Orkey, cursed the Nords so that all of them who were alive at the time of the curse became children. He did this by summoning the ghost of Alduin, who them stole the years of the Nords lives from them. Shor, another god of the Nords, fought with Alduin in the heavens, and Wulfharth learned the shout he would need to restore the Nord's lives from their battling. But the shout wrecked his body. He restored all of his life, but added more years, becoming an ancient man. And then he died. For the first time. Some time later, while the Dunmer and Dwemer were at war, Dagoth Ur approached the Nords claiming to know where the Heart of Shor was located. Ysgramor shouted from Sovngarde, so that the Nords wouldn't be tricked by Dagoth Ur, and they took advantage of the battle between the Dwarves and Dark Elves so that they could get some of their lands back. Because they knew that Dagoth Ur, even if he knew where Shor's Heart was located, would never give the Nords their god back. But Dagoth Ur promised that it was the nature of the Dark Elves to betray each other, and he said that Shor's Heart was among them. He convinced the Nords to trust him, but the Tongues didn't trust Ur. They shouted Shor's ghost back into the world, and from Ysmir's ashes he rebirthed the old king. Dagoth Ur pledged to lead the Nords, but Shor didn't trust him. Despite this, he accepted Ur's aid, installing Ysmir as a second leader so that their could be someone to truly guide the people. Shor was right not to trust Ur. Ur had devised a plan to trap him beneath Red Mountain, the destroy the Nords. Ur had learned that Shor intended on destroying the Dwarves and all who allied with them. Despite their bad blood, the Nords met with the Orcs, and forged an alliance to go to war with the Elves in the east. Nerevar went to challenge Shor on Red Mountain, carrying Keening, a dagger forged from the sound of the moons' shadows. With him were Dumac Dwarfking who carried the divine hammer Sunder and Alandro Sul, an immortal child of Azura who wore the Wraith Maille. Before their battle Shor retrieved his heart. Dumac bashed Shor with his hammer, turning the god's heart corporeal. Just after, Ur turned on Dumac and slew him on the spot. Nerevar was enraged and went to attack Ur, but Shor killed him first. He feigned death before it truly came, and stabbed Shor through the heart with Keening, slicing it from his body. All the while Wulfharth was fighting Sul. Sul proved too powerful, but Wulfharth shouted his eyes out before a blast from Vivec sent the Ash King to Oblivion. But, before his ashes reached Oblivion, Kyne took them and scattered them across the sky, which turned the red of blood spilled in betrayal. Now, why do I say this here and not just point you to the Five Songs of Wulfharth, which you could easily buy ingame or read online? Well, because some of you wouldn't. Just as some of you skipped the above. Anyway, I really bring it up to provide the context for this statement: Ysmir is not Talos. His soul was needed to produce Talos, yes, but they aren't the same god. Talos is more Hjalti Early-beard or Tiber Septim than the others that make up his soul. Talos is an Imperial God. Take a moment to remember the horse thief from the intro. Which gods does he call out for as you all enter Helgen? They are also Imperial gods. And while their names may be similar to Nordic ones, they are not the same gods, just as Ysmir and Talos aren't. The Imperials already won. Look at every temple, shrine, or holy person in the game. They all worship or are made for the worship of the Imperial Nine or Eight Divines. The biggest rallying point the Nords have is a god they shouldn't be worshiping. And not only do they worship him, they worship him in place of one of their greatest heroes. I'll go a step further. The Nords are essentially Imperials with a different accent by the Stormcloak Uprising. The Nords used to adore fine drink and fine song, and now... They have no meadhalls, and the only institute dedicated to music in their country is more interested than burning effigies than singing about the people those effigies represent. How many times have you heard the bards sing about Ragnar the Red? All of them were trained at the school, yet the only song of any legendary figure they know is about a boastful drunkard. And onto architecture, the Nords abandoned their original way of living, which made much more sense considering the cold. Though the Nords do still use wood in the construction of their homes, originally they built their homes halfway underground to keep them warm. This technique is gone by the time the game Skyrim takes place in. They were also masters of stonecraft, yet by the time of Skyrim the ruins their ancestors built thousands of years prior have come to be mostly buried under snow and soil and abandoned for the more Cyrodiilic hamlets and cities. Even as you walk down from Helgen, Ralof will comment that he's afraid to live in the shadow of Bleak Falls Barrow. To live beneath the majesty of such a construct should be an honor, not something to fear. The structure of Nordic society is also much more Imperial. Their Jarls are essentially Cyrodiilic Counts in all but name. Gone are the warrior-poet kings beholden to only those they ruled, and fiercely fighting to defend and expand their kingdoms. Ulfric at least somewhat embodies this to a degree, but he gives it up in the end. Yes, the Moot decides who is High King, a position that his somehow still survived. But it's ultimately meaningless. The High King isn't needed to unite the Nords anymore, because all of the Jarls are complacent to stand within their hold borders and not seek adventure and build strength through adversity. Ulfric tells you to hunt an icewraith to become one of his soldiers. The old Nords would send their boys to do this, and when the boys came back with an ice wraith's carcass in the dead of winter, they would become men. So the Stormcloak's greatest claim to righteousness is founded on an Imperial beliefs. Nordic society and religion have become Imperial. The Nords themselves act like Imperials. And so there's no point in the rebellion. A united set of Imperials is better suited to fight the Aldmeri Dominion than the Imperials and the totally-not-Imperials. tl;dr the Nords have lost everything that made them Nords, the Stormcloaks don't know what they're fighting for, and a united Imperial front is best to beat the Dominion.
Actually it belongs to the Reachmen, Falmer, and Dunmer they stole the land from. If you think conquering land makes it yours then that's a valid opinion, but the Thalmor think that as well.
The Nords were the first humans on Tamriel. The Falmer and the Dwemer killed each other in the Aetherium Wars, but you could argue that they were on Skyrim first. As for the Reachmen, they invaded Skyrim and took the Reach by force, occupying it for two years. They're flesh-eating demon worshipers.
Actually you're 100% wrong on the last part. The Reach was stolen from High Rock by the nords about a thousand years ago. It wasn't originally Skyrim land. It was High Rock. That's why parts of eastern High Rock is known as "the western Reach". It was the land of the tribal witchmen, mostly of breton descent. Sure, you could argue that might makes right, that the nords won the land by virtue of victory, but the thalmor feel the same way about their right to enforce their laws on the nords. You can't have it both ways. Also, we have no idea if the reachmen religion necesitates flesh eating and sacrifice, or if the forsworn are just extremists driven to the brink. Know why? Because the nords outlawed their religion. It's also worth noting that when the reachmen took over Markarth, things were surprisingly peaceful. Go back and play the game. Go to Markarth. Notice how the nords always talk about how the reachmen conquered the city? But not a single one of them has anything to say about what they did when they ruled it? Isn't it weird that they completely avoid the actual events of that 2 year period? They just gloss over it and mention how Ulfric saved them all? Ever wonder why? Read a book called "The Bear of Markarth". In it, you learn the reachmen treated the nords with basic decency. There was little disruption to their daily lives, especially when compared to an "average" conquest, and were even in talks with the Empire to be recognized as an official territory. Then Ulfric came in, killed every man woman and child, native or nord, who refused to take up arms against the reachmen, and "liberated" the city. Now of course this account could be biased, but it's the only account we have. It would also be pretty difficult to fabricate some of these claims. There would be diplimatic records between the Empire and the Reachmen, eyewitness accounts of children being killed by the nords etc. Based on all the information we have, this account is as close as we can come to the truth. The reachmen can't own land, and if they do it's stolen from them. They're thrown in prison for spurious reasons to work on the mines. Their religion is outlawed, while the nords complain that their genocidal, regicidal (See: Cuhlecain), backstabbing god-king is banned. The nords got what was coming to them as far as I'm concerned. Also, the nedes likely got to Tamriel before the nords did. They moved south and most of them became the Imperials, the rest eventually died out or interbred with nords, elves, and redguards. The people that would eventually become the nords were among the last of a series of atmoran expeditions to Tamriel. It's one of the regions nords retained so much of their atmoran heritage: they've been on tamriel for a shorter period of time.
+Hans Ollo Have you not heard of the Nedic Tribes? They lived in High Rock and Cyrodiil in the Merethic Era, and breed the Bretons after generations of mating with High Elves. Considering Reachmen are most-likely Breton(Skill in Magic, and their location in Skyrim). Nords were the last Humans to reach Tamriel coming in the Early-to-Mid first Era. And since the Nedes died off before the First Era, we can make the assumption that either Reachmen, or atleast some type of Breton, occupied the area long before any Atmoran or Nord.
What's this?? Someone else with an opinion? Not on my watch! In all seriousness I find most human races in Skyrim kind of arrogant or just bland. Many nords in particular just seemed short sighted and just as arrogant as the Thalmor. More often than not I found myself excited to see khajiit, argonians, orcs and dark elves more than any of the humans except maybe the Alikr guys. I will however say that the few "good" nords I talked to were probably the most loyal and kind hearted out of all the human races. So they do have that going for them when they actually care.
1. You get your own god stolen. 2. 30 years of religieus persecution. 3. The empire lost the capital to the thalmor, they won it back it was their first real victory. The emipre signed their surrender. 4. The red guards had to give up half their nation they refused and fought on. They got kicked outta the empire fighting the thalmor to a standstill (alone), which got them their land back. This was right after the empire surrendered. Here we are 25 years later and you are telling ulfric and his men to fight with the empire? Strange thing they dint help the red guards. They stoot and looked how the thalmor took mother fathers sons and daughters?
It first elder scrolls game was skyrim, and the Nord's were my favourite, but when I played oblivion and morrowind, my god, they felt so much more unique
Skyrim was my first game. I like and sympathize with them, like Bethesda intended. But they did it too much. I naturally have a distaste for the Empire and side with the rebellion only when I play a Nord, otherwise I'm neutral. Skyrim is still an interesting and fun game and I still like the Nords.
psychotrip The Anatolia was belongs to the Greek people but now Anatolia is belongs to the Turks because the Greek people couldn't defend their land but Turks did. Falmers,bretons,dunmers couldn't defend Skyrim but Nords did.
So by that logic, everything the Thalmor are doing is justified because the nords haven't stopped them yet. By that logic, the parts of Hammerfell in control of the Dominon rightfully belong to them because the redguards couldn't hold it. By your logic, the Imperials own Skyrim because it's part of their Empire (and let's ignore the fact that they built the roads, forts, and trade routes that keep Skyrim prosperous). And before you bring up the possibility of the Stormcloaks winning The Civil War, the only thing determining who wins is what side you choose in the beginning. So, the Civil War is won because of you (regardless of your race) not because of the nords. So we're left with a nation that can't defend its own land unless it has a super-powered dragon in human form. So, who does Skyrim belong to again?
the rise of the falmer is coming ;) :D they have skill, numbers, and are learning to reclaim their intellect, the aldmeri dominion won't be safe as long as dwemer technology and falmer are so close with a potential for disaster.
the snow elves tried to wipe out nords first so karma is a bitch, and they did not exterminate them they chased them away. the dwemer was the ones that enslaved them and made them into falmer.
shores bones i now that bethesda destroyed the nords by removing the nordic pantheon as the main religion. cookie? no they should have been more cookie sadly most of the nords are just like imperials in skyrim. but boring hell no they have one of the most bad ass history in tamriel.
Errr not so fast there... The Forsworn worship Daedra, entities we can all agree are pretty damn evil. Since a deity has more power the more worshipers it has, it's necessary to prevent the Forsworn from performing their rites. The Thalmor have another goal in mind. Talos seems to have many aspects and one of them is a slayer of Elves. The more people worship Talos the God, the more power he has, and the Thalmor want the opposite. Furthermore, the highest ranking Justiciars in the Thalmor know about the real motives of the Thalmor; unmake the world. They want to return to their original form as spirits. That's what Ancano was doing with the Eye of Magnus. It's all fairly more complicated that hypocrisy though I agree that the Stormcloaks are pretty damn hypocritical. There are also Nords that want to side with the Empire, regardless of religion, because they understand that the Thalmor will only be defeated by an united empire. Of course... we didn't get the Nords that conquered Skyrim after the Night of Tears. We don't get the Nords like Ysgramor. We don't even get the Nordic pantheon.... just the Imperial version of Skyrim with scrawny women and pompous fops - the opposite of what Nords are supposed to be: Bulky, strong, fearless and actually very strategic in combat. I don't hate the Nords, I hate who wrote them in Skyrim.
I always choose stormcloaks because of the mission in whiterun where the Thalmor kidnaps a greymane son and is keeping him prisoner torturing him, I feel personally about that because eurland greymane is a guy I admire, he is pure nord to me.
The way I see it, none of that would have happened if not for Ulfric's rebellion. We learn early in the game that before the Markarth Incident, nords worshipped Talos and were rarely punished for it if at all. The thalmor manipulated Ulfric to start the rebellion so they could have an excuse to increase their presence in Skyrim, further infuriating the nords and dividing the Empire. It all goes back to Ulfric's actions during the Markarth Incident. By perpetuating the war, you're helping the Thalmor break up the Empire.
psychotrip so the thalmor made ulfric basically, that further intices me that I should choose the faction against them no ,after how radical the leader is
The Empire is against the Thalmor as well. A united Empire is the only thing that can stop the Thalmor. As you learn in the imperial storyline, the Empire has no plan on negotiating with the Thalmor. They signed the Concordat to buy themselves time before going back to war. Recall that a united Empire barely beat back the Thalmor in the first place, and even then they had to sign a shitty treaty. Dividing the Empire can do nothing but help the Thalmor in the long run.
The Empire are full of BS. They are just puppets of the Thalmor, kidnapping, torturing, and murdering their own people in fear that the elves will do it to them. The Stormcloaks are doing what is right: defending their homeland and uniting their people against an invading foe. If you had ever actually played through the Stormcloak storyline (which I know you haven't from your video and comments) you would know that a united Skyrim is more powerful than a divided one and is more powerful than a crippled broken Empire that is only allowed to survive to be used by the Dominion. Bowing to the Thalmor can do nothing but help the elves and hurt the people of Skyrim. Imperial dog.
i actually wish you had more options of who to side with. the forsworn and the thalmor are two examples. if i want to play as an elven race, i might agree with the thalmor and be on their side. i wish that option existed. same with the forsworn, it would be cool to play as a reachman and help them win back their freedoms or retake markarth. things like this would have really opened up the game.
yes! i am actually trying right now (for the 3rd time) to do a playthrough where i side with the stormcloaks. i struggle with it because of Ulfric being the worst just in general, the racist nature of those on that side (since I often play a Breton or Bosmer), and the shortsightedness of the whole war in general (with it actually playing into the thalmor's plans and all..). I would love for more options that make the stormcloaks more appealing. My character this time is a Nord huntress who's background is that she was kidnapped by wood elves as a child and, after years of basically being a slave, killed her captors and journeyed back to Skyrim. This is the only way I could justify being a stormcloak. :P
Kayla Wardle you should be honored tonfight for ulfric hes defending the land ur character was born in from the corrupted empire. And word of advice dont let liberal politics disguised in a game corrupt ur mind. Games tv movies etc all tainted with liberal politics its sickening. Bethesda favoring the empire and portraying the nords as badly as they do in skyrim cant ubsee whats going on here . Have u ppl gone mad? Wheres the racist bretons or argonians or elves.... i dont see them. I only see nords who r racist. Liberal self hate injected into video games as if real life propoganda and white self hate wasnt enough.....its ok we will take it.......cus this type of shit only wakes ppl up to more n more liberal bs we love it . Its the reason trump got elected so i say keep it up...the liberals are digging their own hole too much too soon. Guaranteeing trump for 2020 . Hail ulfric the true high king
@@indigorune i am doing a third playthrough right now and i just cant seen to choose the stormcloaks side at all.. i dont agree with nothing they do.. in fact i actually think the that forbidding talos is a good thing
The Nords are my favourite race. My biggest issue with them in Skyrim is how such a proud people fighting for religious freedom have still adopted the Cyrodillic pantheon. E.g they call Kyne Kynareth and the rest of their Gods don't even have temples
I have a feeling most of this who disliked or bashed this video, didn't even watch it.... I went from neutral, to agreeing in full... You made great points.
While i don't agree with nearly all the things in this video, i still agree that nords always seemed cooler in the lore than in game. Personally i liked it better how morrowind represented nords, but still skyrims nords aren't trash imo.
I absolutely agree with the points you're making, and while the Nords' culture has suffered for it, that's exactly why I find the civil war so intriguing. For the most part, games portray similar rebellions in a very "black and white" kind of way. There's the evil, oppressive government and the heroic ragtag group of rebels, and basically your choice is "ultimate power on the side of evil or winning the unthinkable fight for the good guys". In real life, it rarely is that simple. Skyrim's approach is way more realistic. The Stormcloak rebels are flawed, they have their reasons to fight, but they (specifically Ulfric) don't seem to care about the bigger picture. Meanwhile, you have the Imperials who are basically being oppressed themselves by the Thalmor. None of them are happy about the situation, but they are trying to maintain peace in these troubled times by any means necessary, even if it means fighting the rebels whose goals they generally agree with. Also, there are very big variations in terms of "dedication" on the side of the Stormcloaks. You have your cookie cutter racists and bigots, some religious nutjobs and of course Ulfric "Nords rule GTFO Imperials" Stormcloak. But you also have reasonable people, people who got caught in the fight and basically see the fight as no more than a fight for freedom, religious and otherwise. And that is, at its heart, understandable. So in conclusion, if you're a fan of Nords from other Elder Scrolls games, their portrayal in Skyrim might disappoint you. But as a standalone game, I think it creates a fascinating environment that, for once, isn't as easy to decipher as most video games tend to be.
One thing I hate in a series is when the writing is inconsistent. The Elder Scrolls is infamous for this. Most Skyrim players don't know how the lore was much more compelling in the older games. Those whom do can see the potential Skyrim wasted. The excuse of Bethesda stripping out or removing elements in favor of the mass market is a lame one. The casual crowd only want the bare minimum. Catering solely on them means there needs to be sacrifices. Sacrifices that make the experience shallow and bland. Bethesda could had crafted better stories to cater to everyone. Without such sacrifices. The Witcher 3 proves that open world games can have good stories. The casual crowd and the hardcore crowd would all benefit for this.
He felt edgy at the beginning saying he is a racist for mythical people, but you bet your ass he wouldn't say shit about the red guard or say that he is racist against the red guard.
I'm a racist, but a better racist than you because my race is human and my hate goes entirely towards the elves, especially altmer, who are the true enemy of skyrim. I've only played one character in Skyrim and I wanted to be a Nord in order to fell really at home in Skyrim. At first I didn't knew nothing at all about the Stormcloak rebelion or who was Talos, I only knew that Imperials wanted to killme because they thought I was a rebel, no questions asked. Thankfully alduin came to save me and in the heat of battle the stormcloaks welcomed me as one of their own, even offerme the armor of a fallen comrade, in that moment it seemed very simple: the fucking imperials wanted to kill me for no reason and the stormcloaks invited me to join the rebelion as a brother, so I became a proud nord rebel. I thought the most immersive way to play skyrim was to behave like a true nord, go on adventures exploring caves, haunting fighting bandits and even started worshiping Talos. At first i didn´t care about the main quest because i wanted to gain strenght and weapons to be the true dragonborn skyrim needed me to be, so i started to go around helping people with their siple problems gaining experience as I became aware of the poblems and relations between the diferent races who lived in skyrim. I can't remember when I became a racist but I started hating elfs (Maybe it had something to do with the fact that a thalmor patroll atacked me with no reason). The first time i had to face some bandits was when in tryed to cross their bridge, I tryed to intimidate them and they atacked me; i had to kill them in self defence but I took no pleasure in slaying those bastards because I saw a bit of myself in them, like me they were only trying to survive in this hostile land and i hd to kill them because they were fool enough to atack me. The elves were different, I enjoyed killing them because they saw me as an animal who could never comprehend their natural superiority, so i had to prove them wrong by showing how a nord dumbass could still cut through them like they were cake (and i had so much fun while doing it). I continued my adventure until I had to infiltrate the thalmor embasy, where I found out that not only they control the empire but they also had tortured my Jarl Ulfric in order to provoke im to star the civil war. Their true intention was to destroy the empire's power and watlh as they also killed all the elve's oposition betwen te human people, and what better way to do it than starting a never ending civil war between humans? Then I realiced that the empire was doomed and they will forever be economic and political slaves of the altmer and the only hope for human people was the stormcloak rebelion beacuse if they don't win we will be forever slaves under elven peace and control. The empire must fall in order to free us from the altmer controll.
The people of Scandinavia in the middle ages were mainly peaceful farmers, but they didn't write anything down, so only the deeds of the vikings that sailed out and raided Europe is recorded in history books by their victims. That seems to be the case here as well :)
Wow i never knew about how awes- i mean FOOLISH THE NORDS ARE HHAHHAHA ALTMER IS BEST Being real though i started in Skyrim and i always hated the nords because they seemed like generic humans Which as you can see made me love altmer xD I Never Played Oblivion and have played very little of morrowind however Skyrim is my most played game ever, which i've been playing games since i was about 4 (now i'm 13) But if i knew about that Nord Lore Something tells me Altmer wouldn't be my favorite.
Well, I guess I can't run for office in Tamriel anytime soon.
[Edit as of 11/21/17] So...If I had known how politicized this video would get months after I made it, I probably would've thought twice on a few things. At the end of the day though, my main issue with the nords has nothing to do with whatever political interpretations people take from Skyrim. They're just boring, whiny, and nothing like the badasses described in previous games. That's why Skyrim made me hate the nords. Everything else is tangential to the general "normalization" of The Elder Scrolls lore that's been going on since Oblivion.
To those making the argument that previous descriptions of nords were merely "fantastical accounts" and that the nords in Skyrim are simply more realistic: I hear you, I understand this argument, but hear me out for a moment...
*Yes, the Elder Scrolls is full of conflicting accounts. Yes, most descriptions are made by in-game sources which can be flawed. Yes, it makes TOTAL sense for previous descriptions and previous examples of Nords to be more fantastical than "reality". You can totally explain things that way. But this begs the question...*
Why does Bethesda keep resorting to this trope?
Since Oblivion, it seems that every time we finally see something they've built up in a crazy, creative, and high-fantasy manner, it ends up being far more mundane and "normal" than we expected it to be. Why does Bethesda always seem to choose the most boring interpretation of everything they've created? Sure, in real life different cultures often get exaggerated and distorted by stereotypes and hearsay. But for Bethesda, it feels more like a crutch at this point. Think about it:
Imperials went from tattoo-covered, greco-byzantine amazonian aristocrats following thousands of different religions living in a gargantuan metropolis surrounded by endless jungle...to generic quasi-Romans living in Middle Earth.
Altmer went from math-obsessed, magitech nazi-elves living in a dark paradise with skyscrappers made of glass and cities made of coral, to generic high elves living in gray, boring "Rivendell" buildings.
See, for me personally, I loved that brief moment of The Elder Scrolls (From Redguard to Morrowind) where everything was weird, alien, with crazy magitech and over-the-top races. Morrowind was never supposed to be the only "weird" part of Tamriel. There was a time when it was all weird in its own way. I get tired of "gritty, realistic" fantasy dominating the market. The Elder Scrolls stood out because it wasn't afraid to go crazy, and yet it remained grounded in very basic, relatable ways.
The nords were part of this weird world. I loved the idea of them being "sophisticated" savages. A race of people that are simultaneously romanticized and reviled. You especially saw this in Oblivion, where it felt like there was a lot of racism against the nords, even those that had "civilized" themselves. In Morrowind, I got the sense that their culture was legitimately different, even incompatible with the morality of the other races. But rather than seeing them as backwards savages, I saw them as a people with hidden depth, who were merely dismissed as savages because they were different.
I remember reading that there's a core of gleeful cynicism in nord society that drives their strange behavior. They're a people that believe the world is going to end at any moment (thanks to Alduin). They always think the worst is yet to come. But instead of despairing, they find joy in the aspects of life others fear. It's the reason they love violence, it's the reason they seem so gleeful in the worst of situations. It's the reason they sing songs about war and bloodshed. They're choosing to live their lives freely because they've accepted the inevitability of death. They're seen as brutal savages because they simply don't value life in the same way as others.
So imagine my surprise when I get to Skyrim, and find something entirely different. Not a tribal race of semi-nomadic explorers and sailors, living in a brutal land dominated by werebeasts and flying whales, who live in communal long-houses called meadhalls or giant fortress-cities, but a sanitized, "civilized", bland, normal race.
They made the nords "safe", and that's my biggest issue.
We need to face the facts: Bethesda has no desire to SHOW us any of the interesting stuff they came up with. The people who created that version of Tamriel are long gone, and their replacements don't have the desire or the ability to live up to what they envisioned. So instead, they use the "unreliable narrator" trope as a crutch to retro-actively justify their uninspired, generic worldbuilding. They know that, no matter what, there will be fans out there who will justify their decisions using these exact arguments.
Totally understand your point of view. You point out some serious flaws in Nordic reasoning and logic. Before the Special Edition was released I wished there was a way to side with the Forsworn because I saw this hypocrisy as well. You still cant join the Forsworn, but using the Start Another Life mod you can try to role play that idea as close as possible which sort of vindicates the lack of that option in the vanilla version.
When I first played the game 5 years ago, I sided with the Nords because the Imperials tried to kill me, so it was a knee jerk reaction. But as I delved deeper into the story and realized what was going on, I couldnt side with either because they are both violating what we consider human rights. I made many other characters, and usually stayed far away from the Civil War line as I could.
While I dont hate the Nords, I certainly cannot connect with them as when I first started the game. And as for the elves, well, they sort of brought this on. Especially the Altmer and their holier than thou approach to the other races of Nirn. I'm definitely interested in Bethesda producing a game after the events of Skyrim take place. I want to see what happened and how they dealt with the many inconsistencies of the races' logic and approaches to peace. Then again, if there wasnt war, we wouldnt have much of a game to be playing I suppose, but good for you pointing it out.
See I'm a ride or die imperial through and through, which is why I focused on the rebellion aspect a bit too much in this video (there's a ton of examples of how annoying nords are I could've picked instead). Imperials have always been very forward thinking to me, working toward a greater good and willing to get themselves dirty to do it (Mede working with Boethiah for example). As stated in Morrowind, "The Empire works through silence and secrecy". The Imperials think decades ahead, and are willing to take a loss that makes them look craven (banning Talos), if it means they can have a long-term victory in the end. They don't care what you think of them, or if you find them cowardly or corrupt (especially the case for Mede and Abnur Tharn). They're concerned with what they perceive as a larger goal toward a greater good.
And I think the tragedy of the elves in Skyrim is that they're portrayed in such a one dimensional manner. There's a real reason the elves are the way they are, especially the altmer. When you've been fighting a war on two fronts (sload and maormer) since the dawn of time it stands to reason that you'd become a bit xenophobic. When you've kept to yourself for the majority of history, it stands to reason you'd get fed up at the continued genocide and subjugation of your kin and cousins. The altmer are assholes, but I've always sympathized with them because I like asshole characters, and because I understand where their attitude comes from.
From their perspective, mer are the native people of Tamriel and they've been continuously invaded by foreign conquerors who destroy their cities, suppress their culture, and even try to destroy their gods (Maruhk and the dragon break). Comparatively, the mannish races have always been much more expansionistic and prone to create empires than mer, who typically just want to be left alone. The elven races were never happy under the 3rd empire, which was forced upon them by a man they see as a genocidal despot who stole their sovereignty from them. The altmer were actually fine with the second empire, since Reman only asked for taxes and left them alone in most cases. Not only is Talos a symbol of oppression, but he's believed by the elves to be an aspect of the Doom Drum Lorkhan, who is basically their devil figure. The Dominion, from a mer perspective, is a response to what they see as an existential threat to their people from foreign invaders who have never let them live the way they want to live.
Now again that's a very biased aldmeri perspective on things, but I'm trying to explain why they are the way they are.
100% fine. I would have liked it if the banit settlements were more traditional nordic, they weren't bandits as much as tribal nords who would regularly ask you to fight them, fist fights and test your sword arm. the cities(village sized towns) were just to barely nordic, not the kind of people who have ice in their veins. :)
Something as tiny as this would make a world of difference.
if nord traditions in TES matter then the barbarism of the north would have been interesting, as with the incomplete arena at windhelm, such things give a sense of cultural differences between the imps and the nords
I bet when wood elves are the main nation they will have log houses, eat salads, and attack the savage cannibals.
This is the sort of thing I fear.
Are we saying that the wood elves won't be cannibals. I mean, not all of them follow every one of the tenants of the green pact but some do.
The wood elves won't eat salad in there home land.. remember the green pact. Nothing but meat and eating your enemy's lol
I laughed way too hard.
Jeffrey wood elves can't eat salads do to the greenpackt they also can't use wood to build or make anything cause of the greenpackt also they are canables
Skyrim was my first elder scrolls game so I really just went into it looking for a fantasy game. The nord was my first character simply because frost resistance and human. I instantly joined the companions and got my impressions off them. In the end, I sided with the stormcloaks and saw nords as honourable people too set in their ways to see anything past their goals. They are prideful and its a double edged sword.
I always got the sense that Nords were the kind to endlessly relive dead glory. They're that one friend that always brings up past events and how fun they were instead of actually doing fun things. I got exactly that in Skyrim. A bunch of people going on and on about how great their city was once, or how much honor some long-dead warrior had, and a bunch of people mistakenly thinking the word "honor" means "to refuse to let go of petty shit" instead of "conduct worthy of respect".
Tbh, honor is both
Honor is not rolling over and becoming the Thalmor's bitches, leaving your nord allies high and dry (but that's fine, they're a lesser race anyways), making all the death and destruction in the war mean nothing, and then acting like the Nords are the assholes.
Their Fighters Guild (Companions) is literally a bunch of brain dead Hircine loving lycantropic Daedra worshippers, I can’t imagine what would be a bigger fall from grace for a supposed warrior guild in a warrior culture.
I dread the day they decide to set the game in Elsweyr.
As do I.
Or worse. They could choose Akavir.
What's everyone's issue with setting an elder scrolls game in Elsweyr? I don't really have any issues with the Khajiit.
Elseweyr, more so than the other regions, has always been portrayed as particularly exotic. It would be a sad day to see it white-washed.
Jordan Knight yeah let's have it all cat washed. I'm serious, I like the cat people.
While I understand why you'd be dissapointed in the Nords based on what you were expecting from other games, I came into the series through skyrim and I liked the Nords because I have always been fascinated by ancient Germanic cultures like the Vikings, Anglo Saxons, and continental Germanic tribes and the game portrays the spirit of that culture reasonably well. Basically I was craving an open world "Beowulf" and Skyrim delivers that really well. That is the reason that the Nords are my favorite race.
Coming from your perspective I can 100% understand. I'm glad you can still see where I'm coming from though!
Basically the same for all the races.
Nords are stand-ins for germanics. Imperials are stand-ins for meds.
... the unspoken rule is that the aldmer are jews...
Cringe
As someone who came into elder scrolls with Skyrim I cannot stand the Nords and was very confused by this weird affection for them. Your explanation of the Old Lore of them certainly makes me understand that interest in them more.
Yeah. I just hope whatever race they tackle next is given more respect. Thanks for watching by the way! Be sure to subscribe and share this video if you haven't already!
Nords were turned into your cookie-cutter modern-day nationalists, instead of the semi-historically inspired viking-ish warriors that wrote warrior sagas and so on. This is a problem with Skyrim's writing in general. For a few rare exceptions - Dark Brotherhood springs to mind - complexity and interesting plot was abandoned and they apparently *wanted* to write everything extremely blandly, dumbing down and so on. The dialogue is usually jarring as fuck and the prose you encounter tends to be mind-numbingly boring (and immersion sucks; as an example the Nord names are mostly uninspired fantasy-garbage that could be replaced by Fantasy Name Generator lists without anybody batting an eye.) I don't know who to blame, but the writers have to take some of it in my books.
Europeans don't sing legends about any creatures.
The RK The previous Nords were always shown in small doses for the most part. We heard all of this grand viking-esque stuff, but the truth is those Nords we saw were likely just a small percentage of the population. As with real life Norse peoples the vikings were only a job title. Most Norse people weren't vikings. There was no viking culture or anything of the sort. If you were a viking you were someone who went on vikings (i.e. raids). Most Norsemen lived just like the other Europeans of the times with farms, towns, lords, etc. The romanticized version of Norse people we like to think about is just that, a romanticized fantasy. This was probably always the case with the Nords as well.
I mean think about this realistically. A civilization that lived the way the Nords were described previously couldn't actually exist, or rather it couldn't function as an actual society. Imagine Morrowind but the only thing you ever saw was the Ashlanders. That'd be Skyrim if they'd kept the previous lore intact. Just a bunch of dudes in longhouses punching shit to death and drinking constantly. You'd also lose any diversity in the world as the original Skyrim was said to be uninhabitable by other races due to the harsh climate. Would you really want to play a game set in a barren, frozen wasteland with nothing but Nords and no opportunity to play as anything but a Nord? For me that'd take away the best part of ES games.
Anyway, while I love the more alien and unusual aspects of the ES franchise (Morrowind is still my favorite world they've created) it's stupid to say that Skyrim should've stuck completely to the lore. I wouldn't have minded more variety in the cities, and a few more fantastical creatures and quests would've been awesome, but in the end we never could have had an entire game focused on a bunch of nomads. They had to settle the Nords down. They were never going to be able to be the crazy, Conan the Barbarian inspired dudes we thought they were (well, not all of them anyway).
You have a point, and it's a point I tend to agree with. Still, I think you compensate too much the other way. There was clearly an aspect of romanticizing Vikings in the contemporary Nord culture of the times, the Sagas being just one example of that. A lot of people aspired to become warriors - there was a warrior / honor culture aspect (which shares many traits with warrior cultures across the world) to the Scandinavians at the time.
I'm not sure what Bethesda could do to improve the Nords of Skyrim. All I can say is that they felt pretty bland. Maybe if their writing department had done a better job at fleshing out the world of Skyrim in general, the Nords would have felt more authentic, but to me they feel like NPCs with generic Nord hardass accents.
The most disappointing thing about Skyrim is that Bethesda didn't give us a single bewitched naked Norn. You had one job Bethesda...
It confuses me why they model a race after a irl people but only use one of the less interesting aspects of them (vague norse houses). None of the raiding, no nomadic people focused in small holds who all go to war together, none of the savagery mixed oddly with strong family bonds.
Dude, exactly.
seraphilight the nords were way, way cooler in the lore but Bethesda dumbed them down heavy when they made skyrim
That's bandit raiding and not Viking raiding. Has nothing to do with the race. You'll find those exact kind of bandits in any fantasy rpg set in an open world.
Also, they stick to one hideout and don't move. The only nomads in Skyrim are Khajit, old orcish warriors looking to die, and fucking vampires. Not a goddamn Nord soul among them.
That's so cliche
This is the definition of Elder Scrolls lore in general.
In wikis: *EPIC FANTASY STUFF OMGZ!*
In game: "Oh.."
I like how in morrowind and oblivion the nords didn't give a damn about Talos or the other 8 divines and preferred worshipping their own deities (Shor, Alduin, Ysmir etc.) but now suddenly (sarcastic) they care about Talos.
I agree, Skyrim needed more Werebeasts, Meadhalls and Longhouses. There's like 2 Meadhalls I can think of off the top of my head, the one in Whiterun and the one on that Dunmer Island. Come on Bethesda, we need more places to shovel alcohol down our filthy viking throats!
It’s ironic that those who hate nords for “racism” defend the Dunmer who the biggest racists in the elder scrolls.
True, but the Dunmer are by far the most interesting group in the Elder Scrolls.
Well I kinda just went with their hypocrisy. I started out as a Nord and played may character really as one of the badass adventuring warriors the nord were once told to be. When I came to the Reach I didn't care for the squabbles and plight the foresworn had to suffer under nordish reign as I was attacked by them without any apparent reason on my first visit there they had dug their own grave. Also I was a god damn Nord and after seeing one of their Hagravens and Thornehearts for the first time my character had his mind made up: this was an evil religion that deserved no place in the lands of the divine Talos himself.
Hah, Gaaaaaayyyy
"My character had his mind made up"😂
Based
I had the same exact experience, I was roleplaying as a Nord. And I acted like how a Nord would act. Those forsworn guys attacked me and my companion on my way to markarth. I hated them at that point.
the worst problem i had with the game... play an argonian, khajiit or dark elve. There are so many nords that hate these races a lot but they never seem to mention it towards you, if you play like one. The only time where you might get something like this is in combat with people where some of them say stuff like " i make a new pair of scaleboots out of you" or something dumb like that.
Khajiit are not allowed into cities but you roam in and out with no consequences whatsoever. Argonian are still kind of seen like slaves or scumb and you almost never see any of them beside being thieves or assassins. Dunmer can walk around in windhelm without problems etc.
Exactly. It's not like RPGs haven't done a better job with this for decades. So why is Skyrim slacking? Thanks for watching by the way! Be sure to subscribe, and share this video if you haven't already!
Actually Ulfric react to your race when you want to join the stormcloaks
But then there's no other consequences. Compare this to many, many other RPGs that came out in the last 2 decades. Again, why is Skyrim slacking? You deserve more than a few throwaway lines. You deserve genuine, different experiences each with their own advantages and drawbacks.
Not only experiences but also gameplay changes... Imagine if you play a Khajiit and cannot enter any town, forcing you to gain some reputation and trust first.
Exactly. On the flip side, imagine if you got access to extra quests and huge discounts from the caravans. Players should have benefits and drawbacks based on the way they build their character. This is how RPGs work. Bethesda needs to catch up.
What if the bandits of Skyrim, some of them anyway, were instead the extremely traditionalist, nomadic raiders hinted at in the previous games?
I've heard this suggestion before and I wish Bethesda thought about that.
Don't like it? TO BAD! This is our city. OUR CITY! Skyrim is for the Nords!!!!
...Okay?
For the og Nords not the new Skyrim Nords.
You make some good pints but some just don't really make since to me personally.
A) I personally like the Nords being racist hypocrites. Why? Because it makes them more human and show that not everything is sun shine and rainbows. Racism and hypocriraces good in fantasy plots bc it makes them more real in comparison to our own history. Also the Nords are not the worst when it comes to racism, that obviously goes to the high elves who even see their fellow mer as inferior, (Fun fact: High elves are all about Eugenics and actively use selective breeding to try to produce the perfect race.),but all races in Tamerial are racist. Elves generally look down on humans, humans look down on elves and each other. The beast races and the orcs general don't trust any of the other races due to them being isolationist or previous wrongs dond to them.
B) The eastern part of the reach as been inhabited by nords since the 1st era Skyrim takes place in the 5th. And the only ones who see the Reachmen religion as "good" are the Reachmen themselves. Like no one likes the Reachmen whether they are Mer, human, or beast. Why because it involves human and animal sacrifice, consorting with demons, and witches/Hagravens as religious leaders. And Reachmen do own property is Skyrim and its those that have converted to the 8/9 divines. Example the village of Karstad(sorry for spelling) the guy who owns the mine is a Reachmen, true a Nord family is trying to force him to sell his mine but that is just cutthroat business dealings.
C) As for playing in the Thalmor plans an independent United Skyrim could throw off the elves just like the Redguards did. Though the civil war has weaked Skyrim it could still rebuild. I honestly think the best course for Skyrim independence would have been if Ulfric convinced the High King to declare independence from the empire. Since if you speak to the Court mage in Solitude you learn that the High King idolized Ulfric especially when he gave his speeches on and independent Skyrim. But Ulfric wanted power and now and independent Skyrim is going to have and uphill battle.
I see your points but ultimately just disagree with them, but hey to each his own. And sorry for any misspelling.
The problem is not that they are racist. The problem is how the game tries to portray them as the heroes of Skyrim. You never really support anything else but one of the two human factions so who cares about if the some stupid elves are bad or not?
The whole game focuses on portraying the Imperals as the bad guys and the Nords as the good guys. Still the nords are the most corrupt, the most racist and the most oppressive. The reality of how how the game portrays the Nords is in conflict with it self. This makes it even more obvious how bad they are with this stark contrast.
The game makes you want to like them. At the same time there is nothing to like about them to begin with. Either you accept them for who they are and hates them for it or you try to ignore all the things talking against them being a lovable faction.
@@MegaBanne This arguement was retarded and invalid.
I dont think he was saying the racism was the issue, it's that they lost all their interesting aspects outside of being racist and proud lol. All their good and interesting sides were restrained.
@@MegaBanne
I for one never felt that the nords, even the damn stormcloaks, were as racist as peoples everywhere seems to suggest
You got 2 drunkards in windhelm who insults dunmers refugees.
Fair enough, even the goddamn imperials tend to consider themselves above other races
To me nords are just isolationistic just like the orcs are and yet nobody blames the orcs for that
@@KalashVodka175
It is not like the orcs decides the faith of Skyrim. They may be bigoted, but they keep away from population centers. They also have strong traditions that does not go well with most other races.
They do not let other races move in and then treats them as second rate citizens. Forcing them to be segregated, pay heavy taxes and generally treat them like piss. The argonians are not even allowed to live within the walls of windhelm. This is nothing comparable with the imperials.
The orcs is a nomadic people. They have not inherited ancient cities to live in.
I can't say that I particularly "like" the Nords one way or another. But that said, I also can't say I particularly agree with several of your points.
Fact is, the Nords are shown as having an adventurous culture, just not everyone follows it. Of course outsiders are going to define the culture by the more extreme examples, in the same way so many other nations see Americans as overweight "gun-toting, prideful, xenophobic, nationalistic". Few Americans are actually like that, and yet, the ones who ARE leave the biggest impact on how our country is viewed. It's the same with the Nords, and thus plenty of adventerers can be found throughout Skyrim.
Futhermore, as others have pointed out, not all Nords are shown to be hypocritical in the way you have described. For example, what good is the Markarth example when you remember that Markarth sides with the Empire, not the Stormcloaks? The people of Markarth are much less invested in Talos worship for that reason. I would take it a step more and even say that the Nords are meant to be hypocritical to some degree, as are real-life cultures.
Which brings me to my final point. I didn't see any reason to assume the player is meant to "fall in love" with Nord culture. What's your reason for saying that we are? Just because it's set in Skyrim doesn't mean we're supposed to root for them, as your Morrowind example proves. In a game like Skyrim, the player is meant to create their own character and interpret them and put them into the world as they see fit. You are free to side with the Imperials in the Civil War, support the Forsworn during the "Forsworn Conspiracy" quest, wreck general havoc on Nord society.
Tl;dr the Nords are adventurous, the hypocrisy is realistic and also not as prevalent as you suggest, and the player is meant to come to their own conclusions.
Actually USA does have the most Overwieght people out of all the countries but the other things you mentioned about USA your correct thats only a small portion
i mean whats wrong with being "gun-toting, prideful, nationalistic" or even xenophobic
Obvious troll is obvious.
I live in Arkansas, buddy.
The point in the video was: Before Skyrim in ES lore, Nords were interesting.
Now, we go into the game Skyrim:
Nords don't live in settlements they were supposed to live in in the lore.
There are almost no were-beasts. (few werewolves in base game, and some werebears in dlc, but those, and many others were supposed to be common)
Nords don't follow the religion they had in the lore (and as found in different comments here, someone linked an article from development, where nords very much still had their own, unique religion).
What nords kept are some of their flaws, but the best, and most unique about them... is gone.
The point of the video isn't falling in love with Nords, it's that they are not what they were described as for many years (in the lore in previous games). The concept of their culture being distinct, and in conflict with others is kept, but the culture itself was ripped out of the game (which made for more boring Nords).
(similar thing happened to imperials, who used to be based on slightly different culture, had tatoos, and Cyrodiil was a rainforest zone)
I think this is what I wanted to say, but put in a way that's better than I ever could have myself. Thanks!
Skyrim made me love the wood elves
Pretty much, bro.
Skyrim made Me Love the dark elves
I've always loved Redguards as they're a rather interesting and unique race when you look into their lore.
Same! Hope they won't water their lore down like they did with other races.
Only for us to go to Hammerfell and they become dark-skinned Imperials.
Eh
"I'm completely uninterested in the nords" talks about them solid for 10 minutes
"I hate eating shit" talks about why he doesn't want to eat shit for a solid 10 minutes
*talks about their flaws for a solid 10 minutes
*still had to write out a ten minute speech about there flaws.
Try writing out a 10 minute long speech, its a lot more pages then you'd think. Clearly to talk about something for that long there is interest there.
You're kind of just proving his point. If Nords were well done/interesting, he wouldn't need 10 minutes to talk about their flaws.
This is the most blue pilled analysis I've ever heard
If your argument (or lackthereof in your case) involves a personal attack that only makes sense in your alt-right echo-chambers, don't expect anyone with a brain to be offended by it. Thanks for the click.
psychotrip alt-right? Try again
Or I could just soak in your continual cents of ad revenue and call it a day.
I swear, some people can being real life politics to literally anything...
psychotrip Jesus dude it's a game. Why are you being so cringy about it lmao
"Do you like the Nords and think I'm crazy? What are you favorite and least favorite races in fantasy?"
For once I'll answer one of these 'let me know in the comments' questions because this one is interesting.
Yes, I like the Nords and think you're crazy. Many of the points you made were quite true. The older ideas of the Nords sound *much* more interesting. They were supposed to be Viking Age Scandinavians, and now they are more like high middle-age, early renaissance Scandinavians -slightly burly and unruly fishermen. That said, I don't think they completely failed in the illustration of the 'noble savage' trope which seems to be the intention for the nords.
Some of the opinions voiced, however, I really disagree with. Firstly, I don't sympathize with the idea that because Nords are hypocritical they should be denied liberty of their own. You didn't explicitly say that, but that seemed to be in a way a put down of the rebellion, saying that their cause for rebellion was hypocritical. That's not how it works. Think of the English occupation of scotland, where they argued very similar points as you and the imperials, or the American Revolution. Just because a people have some violent and oppressive tendencies, doesn't mean they don't have a right to independence from tyranny, occupation, or oppression.
On the same note, I think the religious liberty hypocrisy argument doesn't really make much sense either. What the Nords did to the Reachmen is nothing like what the Aldmeri Dominion and, thus, the empire have done to the Nords because of this one simple reason. Think about how religious liberty works in modern, western society. Would a Reachman be allowed to practice his religion in modern day America? Of course not, the Reachman religion involves human sacrifice, seemingly demon worship, and just general savagery. Religious Liberty doesn't mean freedom to do whatever you want to do religiously, it means protecting people's religion. Granted, sometimes extending the law to allow for certain rituals, but not the the point of human sacrifice or animal cruelty.
And the idea that the empire is the better thing for skyrim because the Aldmeri Dominion wants chaos in Skyrim to weaken it has two problems in my eyes. Firstly, Tyranny and occupation from an enemy force is a really bad thing. I don't think you should welcome Tyrannical control just because rebellion may weaken you in a potential conflict with a greater more tyrannical threat. And secondly, the logic there seems to only work with the assumption that the empire is the default, and that the rebellion is the new imposing change, that the civil war is bad for Skyrim, and so we should not have a rebellion and keep the empire. But that's not the case, the rebellion was caused by the empire imposing tyrannical rule on the Nords, a change from the previous system of government. In many ways, the rebellion isn't really all that revolutionary, they are more the traditionalists, the conservatives, keeping the former system and practices against a changing aristocracy. It's plain to see that the civil war is bad for Skyrim, but I see no reason the solution should be doing away with the rebellion.
Oh, and I like humans (I can get into why, if you want) and I dislike elves.
*"Firstly, I don't sympathize with the idea that because Nords are hypocritical they should be denied liberty of their own."*
I'm not saying that at all. My concern is from a worldbuilding / literary standpoint and not a moral one. Their hypocrisy makes their concerns hard to care about for me. At the very least, if they were as wild and untamed as the lore suggested, then I could respect their bizarre decisions and unruly behavior. It's all about framing.
*"What the Nords did to the Reachmen is nothing like what the Aldmeri Dominion and, thus, the empire have done to the Nords because of this one simple reason"*
You're right. It's objectively worse. The nords are directly enforcing an entire governmental system on the reachmen, are denying them the right to own land, come up with ridiculous excuses to throw them in jail to work on the mines, and that's not even mentioning their suppression of their religion which is only a small part of the larger issue. We don't know nearly enough about the reachmen's religion to know if it necessitates human sacrifice, or if the forsworn are just extremists driven to the brink. We know next to nothing about the reachmen religion because the nords suppress it entirely as barbarian nonsense. But either way, the nords only claim to the reach is by theft and conquest. This is High Rock land annexed by Skyrim. If conquest justifies dominance, which is a valid if brutish perspective to have, then shouldn't the same standard be applied to the elves who now use the law and brute force to enforce their religious standards? You can't have it both ways without looking like a hypocrite.
I can't exactly sympathize with people shouting about religious freedom and sovereingty when their whole society, both historically and in the present, is based on subjugating (reachmen and dunmer) and in some cases committing genocide (snow elves) against entire races.
But again, this is less a moral issue for me and more an issue of quality writing. This whole contradiction could have been a brilliant aspect of the larger plot if it has been utilized correctly. If we could engage with the nords on this, really force them to confront this seeming hypocrisy, or at least get a more clear understanding of their perspective, then the writing would've felt more self-aware. Instead it just feels lazy, half-baked, and remains this giant elephant in the room we can never truly address or take sides on (the escape from Cidhna Mine quest doesn't count, since your decision has no baring whatsoever on the game the moment you complete the quest).
The rebellion, however you want to look at it, plays right into the Thalmor's hands. Ulfric is doing exactly what the elves want. We can talk about the merits of conservatism, traditional values, or fighting against perceived tyranny, but at the end of the day the elves incited this religious tension in order for the rebellion to happen. They want Tamriel in chaos, divided, and unable to fight them as a cohesive unit.
But I could forgive all of this, all of it, if the nords weren't such bores. That's what they were to me. Just a group of whining, hypocritical bores.
You made a lot of good points here and I appreciate your input! I hope you keep commenting in the future.
The Nords are actual idiots. They stole Atmora from the Wandering Ehlnofey, stole resources from the Snow Elves, and proceeded to slaughter them just because they fought back. Nords are the reason High Elves hate humanity, as it was a Nordic Empire that used Numidium in the Summerset Isles to force an alliance. It's the Nords fault that the corrupted Falmer occupy Dwemmer ruins. It's the Nords fault that Skyrim is in a state of peril(They didn't realize that the Empire was actually helping to buy time). It's the Nords fault that the Kingdoms of High Rock hate humans. Nords cause the most problems in the TES Multiverse. I side with the Elves.
ChillBroIt'sJustAPrankBro I agree with you for the most part, except on a few details. The Nords did not steal Atmora from the Wandering Ehlnofey, as they are the descended from the Wandering Ehlnofey. The Atmorans, fore-fathers of the Nords, didn't just steal resources from the Falmer. They stole their land slaughtering thousands, forcing the Falmer to seek refuge from the Dwemer who then enslaved them. Numidium was used by Tiber Septim to unite the entire continent.
Also High Rock is inhabited by humans, Bretons are one of the human races of Skyrim. So they just hate the Nords. And only the Aldmeri Dominion was pleased with the outlaw of Talos worship, the rebels choose to ignore that.
Sorry, I meant the Ehlnofey that occupied Atmora. Nords are most likely descendants of the Akaviri Humans as there is documentation that says Shor/Lorkhan lead the siege on Atmora in attempt to take it from the Ehlnofey, as Shor is Daedric. The point I was trying to get across is that Stormcloaks/Traditional Nords are barbaric in nature, and tend only to use violence as a way of problem solving, and that because of this, it may be the reason why Elves in the time of Skyrim have a natural disliking of Humanity as a whole.
I see what you're saying. The Mer have a deep seated hatred for mankind, the Nords in particular. But as I love getting into the lore of Nirn, I feel obligated to correct you on a few matters.
The Wandering Ehlnofey, the Ehlnofey in which mankind and all non-Mer races are descended from, were scattered outside of Aldmeris (a.k.a. Old Ehlnofey). The Old Ehlnofey, which the Mer are descended from, aren't from Atmora, which I believe you have mixed up with Aldmeris (If I weren't so interested by the lore, I wouldn't care). So Lorkhan (Shor), who is actually Aedric, led siege on Aldmeris (not Atmora), and everybody was Ehlnofey at this point, the difference being those who clung to the old ways, and those who were forced to wander.
Nords are descended from Atmorans, and I've never heard of the Akaviri invading Atmora at any point. But the Akaviri did invade Tamriel in the first era. Though the humans of Akavir have since been eaten by the Tsaesci.
Skyrim made me love the Nords even more.
Glad you liked them! I found the one's in Morrowind and Oblivion much more interesting. They made the Skyrim ones far too bland for my tastes.
@@psychotripnerdstuff To each his own, but I respect your opinion.
Me too. I feel like you really see how true nords are. They are stubborn, proud, strong people who do not allow anyone to push them around.
@@rememberthefallen1970 and also racist and quickly die because of their naiveness
@@rememberthefallen1970 they're drunks and dumb, and it's them who historically pushed people around and genocided people, not even the altmer can claim they genocided a race.
I've always wondered why the nords didn't have any connection with boats, in skyrim. Since they are displayed as norse vikings.
Yeah, same. I mean, “vikings” without boats and raiding are like Mongols without horses and raiding lol
@@guilhermebraga9773 Orcs are Mongols without horses and raiding
@@JPalos88 I'm pretty sure orcs still raid lmao
Because they aren't vikings.
@@cavemancult1999
But not on horses lol
There are numerous problems with your analysis of the Nords, and none of the ideas you've presented are original, they've been parroted by every Empire-loving fan of the series who can't seem to get to grips with the rather straightforward notion that the Empire is terribly mis-ruled. Let's start with the Rebellion of Ulfric Stormcloak. Saying that the struggle only plays into the hands of the Aldmeri Dominion and the Thalmor is correct, but overlooks a singular important point: The Empire is the aggressor. Titus Mede II, by signing the White-Gold Concordat, commits the Empire to enforce the Thalmor's Talos Ban, making themselves servants of the Thalmor, and providing safe harbor for their agents to kidnap, murder, and persecute Talos worshipers. The redress that Ulfric seeks is simply to put a stop to this intolerable behaviour. What good is an Empire if it can't protect its people? The second fallacy/distortion is the false equivalence of the Reachmen, whose armed overthrow of Markarth was thrown down by Ulfric. What you fail to acknowledge that the Reachmen aren't just an oppressed under-class, but an oppressed underclass of *Necromantic Daedra-worshipping cannibals*. Did the piles of bloody bones in their lairs not give you a clue? Did the fact that the Briar-heart men are undead pass you by? If the Reachmen wanted only to live in peace with the Nords, then there would be peace, but their goal is the indiscriminate slaughter of all Nords. When they raid caravans and settlements, they don't take prisoners. You can't walk up to a Forsworn camp, unless you go to the one camp where Madenach escaped to, if you side with them in your escape from Cidhna Mine. Everywhere else, you're kill on sight, even if you're a Breton yourself. However, the biggest single fallacy that you're passing off as insight is that you're treating the Nords as if they're a monolith, an obelisk, and they all share the same outlook, virtues, vices, and values. Which really makes *you* the racist. Some Nords are bad, some are good. Some Reachmen are merely downtrodden and oppressed, some are horrendous murderers. What Bethsoft did with Skyrim, and they did a really good job of it, is they fleshed out a *world*, and put an entire panoply of persons in that world, each with their own motivations, perspective, and goals. And yes, some of those people are hypocrites.
Aaron Long Good points man so true in fact no one side is fully right
How can the guy judge Nords when skyrim is the first time we see there world it's hypocritical they are everything they needed to be in fact skyrim is the coolest province in Tamriel
You're missing the main point of this video though: I just found the nords boring. Regardless of whether you agree with my analysis of them as people, they just felt like imperials with viking helmets to me. I wouldn't have hated them nearly as much if they were presented as the wild, free, rebellious, tribal berserkers that were presented to us in previous games.
Imagine a hulking nord wearing nothing but a wolf-pelt in the middle of a frozen wasteland. There's frost forming on his body, but he hardly notices the cold. There's a mead-hall in the distance, surrounded by a settlement that's both a city and a fortress, with fur tents dotting the outskirts. Men and women are fighting drunkenly, laughing and spitting and drinking and singing. Would you expect these people to care if you told them you banned their god? Would you expect anything other than the flaming shouts of their wise-men? The blades of their shield-maidens? It doesn't matter if these people are hypocrites. They clearly don't care. So what if they conquered others? By their very nature they conquer what they see. They are eternal invaders, breathed into the world by Kyne to take what they want. They have no true "home". Skyrim is merely the greatest of their conquests. Does the wind settle in place? Does the wind attach itself to petty notions of treaty and diplomacy? No. The wind blows. It pushes things out of its way to get where it wants, and what it can't push aside it moves around. The nords are living wind. These are the nords presented to us in books like "children of the sky", and previous games. The nords could have retained their flaws and still be interesting, relatable, and enjoyable to engage with.
That's an opinion you can certainly have about the setting, and I can't really rebut it. I'll agree that the Nord fluff definitely sounded a lot cooler in earlier games, however I'm not sure that fluff would have made a very interesting and varied setting. It certainly would have been a far different game, had they chosen to cleave to the earlier version of the Nords as nothing but psycho Vikings living in a monster-infested wasteland. I do feel like you're right in one respect: There needed to be SOME part of Skyrim that was really untamed, and felt that way, to throw the 'civilized' version of the Nords into sharp relief. I'm not convinced that every inch of Skyrim needed to be that way.
I have to disagree with you about the mis-ruled, in Skyrim the Empire looks weak because the Emperor is smart, he knows that the thalmor want him to send more troops there so it weakens the aldmeri border, the Emperor doesn't send troops or Imperial Governors and experince officers except the General because he knows the Elves want the border to be weaker, his family may be corrupt in Skyrim and seen as weak but he is one smart Empire, you can't say it's mis-ruled it's in capable hands but his governors and generals can't act his will out successfully the dragonborn should become the new tiber septim, I believe the dragonborn soul is recycled into different people's bodies, thus you are basically tiber septim this would make the Empire more effective and the nords would swear allegiance to the dragonborn as they should be loyal to those who use the thuum.
The Empire should control Skyrim, and should be ruled from a Imperial-Nordic Dragonborn Bloodline.
Skyrim made me love the nords. :)
Bronoculars This.
wait love them i could never understand them, they are extremly racist and biased and belives what suits them the best, ontop of that they are quite stupid. The empire yielding to the thalmor was the obvious choise to avion being completly concured by the thalmor and still having a chance to fight back for talos and ahve a chance against the thalmor and not being pretty much enslaved but many nords refuse to se that and blindy follow the belives of talos ignoring and inconvinace with doing so and starting war with the pepole who are trying to make there pepole survive. How are they likeable. Also there strong hatred for magic does not make it any better even thou there hatred is coming from something that was never magics fault they simply conviently listed it as magics fault and started and hating magic and refuse to listen to any reason about it.
I really preferred them in previous games. I thought they were much cooler, more wild, and generally more interesting. What, exactly, made you like them the most in Skyrim? They just felt like bretons with viking helmets to me.
psychotrip Well, to me they always felt more "cartoonish" in the older games. Big, dumb and with a pretty silly voice. Now that isn't too bad, but they felt alot more badass and "real" in skyrim. But that is just my opinion. ;)
That's 100% fair. I think there's a lot of things later ES games have objectively done "wrong" in recent years, but this is totally a matter of taste and I respect that. See, for me personally, I loved that brief moment of The Elder Scrolls where everything was weird, alien, with crazy magitech and over-the-top races. I get tired of "gritty, realistic" fantasy dominating the market. The Elder Scrolls stood out because it wasn't afraid to go crazy, and yet it remained grounded in very basic, relatable ways.
Even though Tamriel was a world with Amazonian, tattoo-covered, greco-byzantine Imperials and north african samurai who can split atoms with their swords, it always came back to basic themes of religion, politics, and human behavior. It was a rare example of the best of both worlds, and it's what made me fall in love with the series in the first place.
Most importantly, there was no "normal" race in Tamriel. They all had their own bizarre quirks and behaviors.
The nords were part of this weird world. I loved the idea of them being "sophisticated" savages. A race of people that are simultaneously romanticized and reviled. You especially saw this in Oblivion, where it felt like there was a lot of racism against the nords, even those that had "civilized" themselves. In Morrowind, I got the sense that their culture was legitimately different, even incompatible with the morality of the other races. But rather than seeing them as backwards savages, I saw them as a people with hidden depth, who were merely dismissed as savages because they were different.
I remember reading that there's a core of gleeful cynicism in nord society that drives their strange behavior. They're a people that believe the world is going to end at any moment (thanks to Alduin). They always think the worst is yet to come. But instead of despairing, they find joy in the aspects of life others fear. It's the reason they love violence, it's the reason they seem so gleeful in the worst of situations. It's the reason they sing songs about war and bloodshed. They're choosing to live their lives freely because they've accepted the inevitability of death. They're seen as brutal savages because they simply don't value life in the same way as others.
So imagine my surprise when I get to Skyrim, and find something entirely different. Not a tribal race of semi-nomadic explorers and sailors, living in a brutal land dominated by werebeasts and flying whales, who live in communal long-houses called meadhalls or giant fortress-cities, but a sanitized, "civilized", bland, normal race.
They made the nords "safe", and that's my biggest issue.
So, I understand your point of view, but can you also see how disappointing this would be for someone who enjoyed the strange "cartooniness" of previous games?
The same exact watering-down happened with Cyrodiil in Oblivion
SKYRIM IS MY CITY
SKYRIM BELONGS TO THE NORDS
Skyrim is a country....
@@TheBrunarr Skyrim belongs to the snow elves
@@yunarukami7943 you mean to Gelebor or those creepy dudes who lives under the ground?
@@vadakatterelohalasz5388 yeah the actual natives of Skyrim
The Forsworn weren't actually originally from The Reach.
Source on that?
Oh got that comment wrong! I mean't the Forsworn weren't the first ones in The Reach but it was the Needs because there are Nordic Ruins and they were in High Rock and Skyrim first before the Aldmeri came and interbred with the Needs.
No problem, and nordic ruins vary in age, all the way up the first era if I remember correctly. The nedic people didn't just become nords either, many of them became the modern day bretons and imperials. Either way, between the reachmen and the nords, the reachmen were there first.
psychotrip Im pretty sure Bretons were mid first era
There's actually evidence of human habitation in High Rock long before the nords arrived. The people who would become the bretons lived there long before the people who would become the nords. By the time the nords began exploring the high rock area, these people were already around. As I recall, The nords even attacked them initially because they thought they might be elves
Something happened between 2008 and 2012 at either Bethesda or Zenimax, or maybe both, that had this effect on all of their games during this period. And it still lingers. I feel like the same circumstances that lead to Nords being "white-washed", lead to ESO being released as a roller-coaster with 60's era animatronics for NPCs.
tl;dr
Bethesda was ordered to stop baking Delicious Pie, and given a metric ton of market driven Cake mix.
I agree with the essence of your statement almost completely, but I will always disagree that watering down a game's world makes it more market friendly. It's a common assumption, but I've never seen any convincing evidence of this. The market just wants an enjoyable experience, regardless of how weird the world is.
Why 2008? While Oblivion had fun and creative quests, the setting and the world itself was probably one of the most boring, unimaginative and generic fantasy realms I have ever seen.
Agreed completely. Oblivion is both my favorite and least favorite Elder Scrolls game, but to this day I've played my (heavily) modded version of it more than any other game I own.
The real sad part is if you read earlier lore than Cyrodiil should be very interesting pitch of Land.
What happened in Oblivion was probably the success of the LotR Movies.
Much of the designs looked very inspired by the Movie designs.
The redguards would like a word with you...
The funny thing from my end as someone who got into the series with Oblivion, the Nords have always been a bit bland. Sure they've always been a bit wild, but other than that they were almost as lacking in really deep flavour as the Imperials (even the Bretons had some really cool shit carry over from Daggerfall). Then I started getting into the lore and learned that it was only the Colovian Imperials that were boring, but Bethesda seemed allergic to giving the Nibenaeans any proper development, and that general state of feeling carried well into Skyrim.
Around this time I started to get into the more insane Kirkbridian lore, and properly understand what that lore meant in context. And the Nords were still boring to the point that where once I just always wanted to play other races more and never really got around to making Nords, I actively refused to play them in Skyrim.
And then I started finding all the Nord lore that was written for Skyrim but was cut ("gutted" according to Kirkbride) from the finished product. The Seven Fights of the Aldudagga, The 500 Mighty Companions of Ysgramor the Returned, Shor Son of Shor, and the big whammy, a portion of a design document on modern Nord totem religion. And suddenly I love the Nords. The very existence of these texts gives me a perspective on the perspective of the descendants of the Wandering Ehlnofey in general, and the Nords in particular, that has made me appreciate the entire series more.
My point, I guess, is that not only did Bethesda fuck up, the original plan was good and then part-way through implementation they fucked it up, leaving just enough of their original intent behind to see it, now that we know what to look for given access to these texts.
Now when I bother to pick up the controller, I can play Skyrim and appreciate it, not as it is, but as a map through which my imagination can take me to these fascinating places. It's very bittersweet experience, so I don't indulge often, even as I become more active in the lore community.
The thing that always hit me the most was when one of the Jarls I think said that 99% of the people in Skyrim still worshipped Talos and it was flying under the Aldemeri radar because no one reported it or anything because they all still worshipped him. Ulfric then went and started the rebellion, which actually drew attention to the issue, and forced crackdowns on worship and the civil war. That's the main reason I always side with the Empire - Ulfric is just making trouble where there is none so he can be high king.
Yea Ulfric is an ass and a glory seeker attention whore and a murderer. Its better to side with the Empire too because if you actually talk to General Tulius and everyone, they are biding their time and playing the long game against the Thalmor in the plans of eventually going to war with them again and destroying them. Losing Skyrim and the Nords would hurt that.
Ulfric refuses to take the crown until the Jarls all hold a moot and appoint him, should they still choose to do so. "Ulfric just wants the crown" is Imperial propaganda. The Empire is working for the Thalmor, kidnapping and torturing their own citizens in fear of the elves. What gives them the right to tell the people of Skyrim what not to worship? Especially because they're wrong about Talos.
A united Skyrim is the best option; every city flying a blue banner, and the true sons and daughters of Skyrim standing together to kick the usurpers out of Skyrim with the Dragonborn leading the charge wielding Wuuthrad.
@@hanburgundy4317 Yeah keep dreaming bud.
@Rathcore X
Already done it multiple playthroughs lol
I can never in good (roleplaying) conscience side with the empire. Certainly not when playing a nord.
The empire tried to execute you for no reason, despite Hadvar's reasoning, and they rolled over to the Thalmor.
Siding with the Empire is basically a cuck playthrough.
I feel like the Nords are more "incomplete" than "flawed beyond redemption". They had their flaws, sure, but so did literally every other race in the game. Without them, we'd never play because of how bland the game would become.
This may be more of an unpopular opinion, but I have almost always sided with the Stormcloaks over the Imperials because of the following logic: either side with the Blue Guys, freedom fighters who were occasionally racist and hypocritical but were just generally trying to keep their homeland from the invaders; or side with the Red Guys, almost-tyrannical imperialists (both in name and in ideology) who were being influenced to war by their allies, who - need I remind you - _were going to execute you in the beginning of the game_ for literally no other reason than, "Oh, you're not on our list of known Blue Guys? Eh, we'll cut your head off anyways. Sorry for the inconvenience."
The Nords modernized as any society would. The Vikings did and later the Normans did. And as to racism? Ulfric isnt a racist he is a nationalist. The Empire is dead and Talos would be ashamed of it. That said I no longer support either faction and think that the war would be bad for tamriel but I still hope they keep Ulfric alive in the next TES even if the stormcloaks losing is canon
Normans were practically Latinized Vikings. They were Vikings who settled down and accepted the Germanic/Latin/Catholic lifestyle of the peoples they were warring against for centuries. Then they became hitmen for the Pope in Italy and rulers in England.
Talos wants his empire to die. He states this in Morrowind when you meet him. Then in the Bloodmoon, the Skaal prophesied that the Septim bloodline will end and that the Empire will die when the Dragon dies
@@thebk247 That empire is already dead. A new empire needs to simply use the old empire's corpse as fertilizer. While I don't believe that the emperor needs to be Dragonborn, he should at least be a Shezarrine (Lorkhan is lord, master, and creator of humanity). Currently, the Medes are none of these things.
To be fair, the religion of the Natives of the Reach in Markarth includes human sacrifice.
>xenophobia
>a negative trait that needs to be balanced
pick one
I think, that I could see the nords as I imagined, if there were also nord tribes having problems with the big citys, because they abandoned the way of their ancestors
Exactly this, dude. 100%.
Forsworn was like that if I remember correctly.
Paul Tucker the thing with the forsworn is like putting Vikings against native Americans, it's like both are pretty cool, but very different.
We do see tribal Nords being savage dickholes out in the wilds. They're called bandit camps, amigo.
HolyknightVader999 look what i mean is, that we should have more nord tibes like strongholds, with quests, or even a third faction, wich is against the empire and the stormcloaks
I always disliked nords or barbs in games. They just seem boring to me. Dark elves tend to be my favorites and sometimes beast men like creatures.
Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought the whole point of the Nords fighting the Empire was because the Empire bent over backwards to appease the elves? After the Great War, the Empire pretty much did everything they asked and still continue to do so. I was under the impression that the Nords no longer want to be ruled by the empire, because the empire is essentially siding with the Aldmeri Dominion. They'd rather be independent.
This is only the case if you know nothing about the Imperials in The Elder Scrolls. The Imperials are a lot of things, but most of all they're devious and politically sneaky. As stated in Morrowind, "The Empire works through silence and secrecy". In short, the Empire is PRETENDING to bend over bakcwards for the Dominion, but they're actively planning to go back to war with them. Since we've never seen the world from the perspective of the Dominion (outside of ESO), we have no idea what the other side of the treaty is like, or if the Imperials are actively sabatoguing the Dominion in the same way the Thalmor are doing to The Empire.
The Stormcloaks, on the other hand, are being directly manipulated by the Thalmor. The Thalmor didn't even enforce the ban on Talos worship until The Markarth Incident, which was orchestrated by the Thalmor when they brainwashed Ulfric. He's since broken free from their direct influence, but the Thalmor are the ultimate reason for this rebellion. They WANT this war to happen and to go on as long as possible. Read the Thalmor Dossier on Ulfric or "The Bear Of Markarth" for more information.
Because, think about it: how the hell is Skyrim going to take on the entire Dominion by itself? Hammerfell could barely fend them off and they have the greatest warriors in the world, and the second greatest navy. The Thalmor want to divide and conquer. Ulfric is playing into their hands. The Empire is playing the long-game.
So, a secret society of political busy-bodies lying about their war efforts manipulating a whole nation of people scared for their lives? Fuck off.
@@psychotripnerdstuff Redguards and Nords are both great fighters, just in different ways. See. When people want to bring in RL politics in ES, they usually go for some racial bullshit. Me? I see the Empire as one that tells its people that they will fulfill their promises "eventually". And "eventually" that either never comes or only comes due to external influence. If it takes the Stormcloaks to force the Empire to hurry it up or die, so be it.
I love the nords!!!!
Skyrim belongs to us!!!!!
Says who?
Says the majority of those who live in the province, the Nords
Nords exterminated the natives, i doubt it's their land.
Skyrim belongs to people of all culture because nobody owns her, She owns you as her own.
@@thelagginggamer1309 Found the imperial
This is nonsense. The Nords are interesting precisely because the nord "image" doesn't sync up with reality as you experience it. It doesn't beat you over the head with, it doesn't give you too many nods, so you definitely get it.
It's intentional and it's present enough so that it makes me think twice about everything that happens in Skyrim, and examine it in a larger context.
Except the reality as I experienced it was boring and agitating. I think you're giving the writers the benefit of the doubt here when I don't think they've earned it. It would be one thing if the writing felt self-aware, if the player was capable of calling out the nords on their bullshit, or if the game just acknowledged it more. It would be one thing if the nords were remarkable or interesting in any way compared to the other human races, but honestly I just found them to be annoying bores.
Intentional or no, the end result is a race I just don't like anymore, and yet the game is shoving this idea of their heroism and honor down my throat.
There wasn't a whole lot to examine though. It was sooo vanilla fantasy. I understand how the lore from Morrowind could just be Dunmeri propaganda, but the nords in Skyrim were just not interesting. They were like Vikings, but without much of the stuff that actually made Vikings interesting in the first place.
I thank Akatosh/Lorkahn every day that I was born a Breton.
The reason for the war is ALOT more complicated then that. Talos mantled Lorkhan, the trickster god that made the world of Tamriel possible, and Lorkhan is the god that removed the high elves power and made them mortal like everyone else. If the worship of Talos diminishes it means that the High elves have a chance to regain their godhood, meaning extermination of all men.
The Empire is weak, and accepting the demands of the high elves was a fatal mistake, the alternative is far worst than centuries of wars.
Fox Doe It's okay because nords are boring. He says while ignoring all the cool nord history. Like the companions and the journey from atmora.
Hustling Days You didn't watch the video did ya? He says right at the beginning he enjoys the back story and lore and doesn't get why they decided to ignore all that and make the race boring in the acrual game
I get what you're going at, but what does this have to do with Nords? You could of made'em pieces of shits and the war wouldn't be any different.
The worship of Talos was doing fine until Ulfric started his rebellion, Alvor from Riverwood says this - everyone had their own private Talos shrine before the Stormcloaks' uprising. And even at the time of the TES5 - look at Whiterun, there is a statue of Talos right in the middle of the city which is aligned itself with the Empire. So Thalmor's war against Talos isn't that effective. The civil war benefits nobody else but Thalmor - humans reproduction rates are much higher than the ones of Altmer, so give the mankind 40 years of peace - and the casualties of the Great War will be completely replenished by the new generations and the Empire can have the second round. Ulfric started his rebellion in the interests of Thalmor, he being an "asset" according to his dossier isn't just a figure of speech.
@@OlegLecinsky I think you're missing the point: both sides are feckin'wrong. Either way, whoever wins, the thalmor win. They banned Talos because he is the protector of man. Rid him out of the picture and you can easily eliminate the entire race without problems from a particular God.
Even if the civil war hadn't start, the Thalmor would have won either way. The truth is the empire of Cyordiil should of died out a long time ago after the first elder scrolls game, because after that it grew corrupt and became a shadow of it's former self. Even Talos agrees on this because you can talk to him in Morrowind saying, "Yeah, the empire should be outright replaced." Not kill them off but replace the order of their form of government.
I'd say once you see everything and read everything in the game, it's clear that the Nords are meant to be portrayed as racist, isolationist warmongerers whom only find peace after dying in battle. Their leader shouted a weaker, younger man to death just because he felt entitled to the entire fucking region of Skyrim. Some npcs are outspoken in saying Ulfric just wants power and doesnt care about Talos. The devs had plenty of voicings against the Nords. You could side with the damn empire and see Ulfric wasnt even willing to negotiate when presented with fair terms, then you could murder him and make him look like a bitch whilst doin it. Not to mention the many dark elf racism encounters....the only people who like the Nords are...the Nords..and i wonder why theres alot of Nords in the game who support their cause, along with quests with that tone...because oh idk..THE GAME IS BASED IN THEIR HOMELAND. Your point about the devs forcing you to like the Nords was......?
Then you haven't read quite everything. The Nords are people who suffered and decided to stop suffering by making everyone else fear them. Their God was murdered for daring to create the World. Their settlement on Skyrim was slaughtered by Snow Elves because they uncovered an ancient, powerful artifact, and decided to keep it hidden. They were oppressed for centuries by the Dragons, and had to fight to be free. After all that, they spread down south, and found fellow humans in trouble, and they helped them. They lost their greatest hero, Ysmir, too soon, and later failed to bring back their God. After all that, the fact that they were willing to live in peace in an Empire, is admirable.
It was a duel, Ulfric did nothing wrong.
i gotta disagree with this. i'm team empire all the way and after literally DOZENS of consequent playthroughs, i never once felt like the game favored one side over the other. the game presented each side of the war as two opposing ideologies that fought for what they believed in. yeah, they both had their flaws and the game blatantly points them out if you're paying attention but there was never a clear cut bad guy between the two, nor should there be. war is far more nuanced than your typical rpg, where the bad guys wear menacing black armor covered in the skulls of dead babies.
furthermore, it's most certainly possible to sympathize with ethno-nationalists. i may not agree with the outlook but the nord identity was most certainly under siege and when an identity falls under siege, members of that demographic tend to coagulate. it's happened time and time again and i can be sympathetic to such a cause, even if i don't agree with its goals.
If you sympathize with ethno nationalists, you ARE an ethno nationalist. I feel no sympathy for xenophobic cry bullies who want to commit genocide for the sake of national sovereignty. Death the Stormcloaks.
Sounds a lot like the Oblivion Issue. We hear about a larg and rich empire formed by two peoples joining together to overthrow their enslaving oppressors. The land is a jungle with lots of wildlife and rich flora, yet in this wilderness they carved out the dominant power in Tamriel. This was Cyrodil.
Then Oblivion was released.
I'm pretty sure they were toned down on purpose. I'm pro empire all the way, but I think the whole point of ulfric was to show that the empire had weakened the nordic culture as well as the nords themselves. If you look back at their ancestors; (The Atmorans), the atmorans were easily the most powerful race to ever exist. Even the giants were dwarfed by there strength. Ysgramor easily wrestled a giant chief Sinmur with ease, then took his giant wives as a reward. The nord were purposely made to be shadows of there former selves in order to further enforce the idea that the empire has weekend the nords. That's why ulfric says nords drink the milf from the false empire. However ulfric is still a milk drinker himself since he wants to worship and imperial God talos. Tiber septim was a breton names Hjalti Earlybeard, and he took credit for many of Ysmir Wulfarth's feats. In reality if the nords want to return to their former glory, they need to outlaw the imperial pantheon and start worshipping the nordic pantheon just like Wulfarth did.
Skyrim made me believe in purging the dunmer. Victory or sovengarde.
It's so sad that such a cool race got such an underwhelming feeling within Skyrim. Skyrim itself is a wonderful game, its just that it could be EVEN better if they were to start sticking more into the roots with the lore of the province and the people that live there. The bandits are laughable without mods, the nords cry and squabble like the Bretons of High Rock and worst of all, as stated in this video, the Stormcloaks from the start to finish are generally painted as the "good" guys when evidence CLEARLY points to this being false. They're noble in their cause, however they fight the wrong fight.
Dude you said it perfectly.
I can't agree less with your argument against the Stormcloaks. The game has a fair representation of both. The game lets you form your own opinion on the warring sides. You seem to think it is cut and dry, however both sides have positives and both have negatives. At the time of Skyrim the Empire is crumbling. It used to rule all Tamerial. Now the Aldmeri control the south, Hammerfell has rebelled, Morrowwind is in chaos and Blackmarsh is inhospitable. From the point of view of Ulfric, come the next war the Empire will lose. As for the racism talked about in the video. Nords have always been a little xenophobic, it is not a massive issue for most races, but in game you will see a special dislike for elves. After a large war the reason is pretty obvious, but they seem to harbour more hatred for Dark elves. Looking back through the lore this becomes much more understandable. Dark elves are disliked by everyone. They worship the deadra, they practice slavery and the biggest issue for the Nords, they destroyed the heart of Lorkhan. Lorkhan for the Nords is Shor. You may have noticed he is quite important to them.
The imperials have their arguments too. They say that whatever Ulfric claims, the main reason for his rebellion is greed for power. They argue that dividing the empire further will surely result in its defeat and Aldmeri will conquer all Tamriel.
To sum up, I believe the game gives equal representation of both sides and there is not clear right and wrong.
As for your other point, I would say that it maybe due to the limitations at the time.
Stormcloaks are never really painted as the "good guys", they are very well contrated to the Imperials. Imperials for one have a tyrannical occupation of skyrim. Yes, the Stormcloaks do fight for some noble goals, but you can see it in Ulfric, which is the leader of the rebellion, but he himself is constantly questioned to whether he really wants to free Skyrim or just have power.
No race or faction is good in Skyrim but you could argue that the imperials aren’t that bad. The Aldemeri Dominion wants the Nords to beat the empire. The Nords alone cannot beat the whole of the dominion and General Tullius understood this. The empire was in rebuild mode from the previous war so their strat was to work with the dominion until the dominion gives them a reason to go to war again. The empire winning skyrim would gain them the nords as allies, the empire losing skyrim only effectively makes every faction weaker to the dominion.
You could Argue the Nords are right though for rebelling as it was their land in the first place and both the empire and the dominion are tresspassing onto their land and stealing it. It’s completely understandable that the Nords are pissed off and they can’t even worship Talos under the Dominion. The only thing holding the Nords back is they don’t give a shit about fighting for anything other than skyrim and about half of them hate other races because they want to be isolated on their land.
Oi vey nord don’t remember the night of tears!
Based
While it never dawned on me how bad the Nords where, even before then I was an Imperial Sympathizer because...really and truly the Civil War was stupid...
Even without the hypocrisy it was clear that the Empire only signed that treaty to buy themselves some time. Honestly why else would a nation ban the STATE RELIGION? They wanted time and so did the elves. And if if the rebellion succeeded, then what? The Empire, weakened as it would be, would most likely be conquered by the elves and Skyrim would follow soon after. Even if Ulfric wasn't an Altmeri puppet, what is one little province going to do against the power that conquered the damn continent?
In the long run, once the Empire was sure of its strength again, it would pissed on the treaty, because it did nothing but made them look weak. Talos worship would return and such, and in the meantime, all people had to do was not mention his name when the damn high elves were nearby.
The sad irony is, despite the xenophobia of the Nords, their petty war was only going to help the very race they hated and no one else.
They claim to want religious freedom from the Empire, YET THEY WORSHIP IMPERIAL DIVINES. The irony is so fucking real.
the AD use spies and the like in proxy wars, not all out war as they are very few in number also it's near impossible use anything but brute force on the nords
The Nords are right in defending their land from the Thalmor. What is left of the Empire is not what it used to be and are now just puppets of the Aldmeri Dominion, kidnapping and torturing their own people in fear of it being done to them. The Stormcloaks know that only fighting back will help them; "with our blood and our steel we will take back our home." The elves are racist assholes who need to be put in their place and will be one Ulfric unites Skyrim.
ChillBroIt'sJustAPrankBro Congratulations, you don't know the lore at all. The Nords took on the cyrodillic pantheon the moment they bowed down to Talos. Now the Dominion bans the worship of the person they followed (to the point where they took on Talos's imperial pantheon). And the Nords still worship the old pantheon. There's Shor, Kyne and etc. Just different names.
No. Rebels would not worship the untraditional gods that the Imperials worship, especially if they wanted to show true independence. And I never knew the Nords worshipped Akatosh(They didn't, or ever did), or that the Imperials worship Alduin...? Or that they interpret the gods in the same way the Empire does(which is a completely retarded thing to say especially considering the Nordic lifestyle). No. The Gods are not the same. Look up the Nordic Pantheon and see what the Gods represent. And if you really wanna bring up Shor and Kyne, how many times do you see them in the game, besides in a few side quests? The Nords of Tamriel are clearly based on the Nords of the Dark Ages, who named days of the week after their gods, and held them as close, if not closer than family. And I want to see some proof of this idea you have that Nords follow the same religion as the Empire because of Talos, because, you know, people aren't free-thinkers apparently.
Skyrim is for the Nords! Tamirel is for the Nords! Fight with honour! Fight to the death! For Asgar......sovngarde!!!
The way I see it the empire is fighting for the physical form of Talos while the stormcloaks are fighting for the very sole of talos himself
Seeing nomadic tribes would have been pretty cool.
I know, right? All they had to do was switch the bandits out for wandering nomadic nord raiders or something. A tiny change that would've added a lot of flavor.
It could have been treated like a smaller version of the civil war, where if you befriend one tribe you automatically make enemies with another. Or instead of becoming a Thane, doing quests could make you an honorary member of a tribe, and give you the ability to roam their territory without being attacked on sight.
All great ideas!
I thought the nomadic Nordic tribes were all gone, considering it’s the end of the era in the middle of a civil war.
While I agree that Skyrim made the nords boring, the markarth incident didn't go down like that. The empire first conquered the reach back in the first era before and it was it's own kingdom not apart of high rock. The foresworn however refused to surrender so the empire gave the land to the nords, they have been at a state of war ever since. During the great war the foresworn captured markarth and declared the reach an independent kingdom. Because of the war the empire couldn't send troops to reclaim it. After the war they were still recovering so the emperor made a deal with ulfeic stormcloak in which if ulfric gathered an army of nords warriors and reclaimed markarth, then the nords could worship talos, directly violating the empires treaty with the aldmeri dominion. Ulfric gathered the army and captured markarth and in return the emperor allowed him to worship talos. However the thalmor found out about this agreement and put their foot down, they demanded to be able to send troops into Skyrim to hunt down talos worshipers. or it would mean another war. Since the emperor is a little bitch he let the thalmor into Skyrim. That is what started ulfric rebellion, next time do some proper research.
Yeah, they’ll regret that once the Thalmor have a large enough occupation for a coup of Skyrim. The Thalmor were going to come to Skyrim regardless of the Markarth incident. Skyrim i practically impossible to invade and what better way to invade via the WGC and overthrow it like they did in Valenwood.
Nords are like saiyans of the fantasy world. They're a warrior race.
They're also idiots like the Saiyans.
I love the wood elves so much. My character is mostly neutral, so she doesn't pick a side for the civil war. I used alternate start so that I could establish my character and give her a “normal” life before starting the main quest line. I usually go for being the master thief and/or assassin so that my character eventually becomes a reluctant hero. This way my characters aren't just thrown into their destiny. They have to find it themselves.
Something to bear in mind is that TES5 is 200 years after TES4 and such. That's a long time for religion and culture to change.
Very true. I'm not saying these differences don't make sense or are contradictions in and of themselves. My issue is that Bethesda chose to change the nords in this way. Any reasoning behind it may be valid within the game world, but didn't have to happen.
Serithi Thing is the Nordic pantheon had been around for thousands of years. I'm not saying it couldn't happen but to me it doesn't seem as likely. Either way imo if the old Nordic Pantheon was still well established in the time of Skyrim I think it would have made the Nords way more interesting and also distinct from the Imperials. Fudgemuppet has a great video on this!
Yeah, I think that in the course of weaving the civil war into the story, they ended up making the nords act like petty bitches instead of proud warriors. They shouldn't have bothered so much with the aldmeri dominion vs empire vs nords shit, and paid more mind to the main story- which was a perfect conductor for nord characters.
I think a better writer could've balanced the two stories well without sacrificing the nord's character. I should also note that Skyrim had no dedicated writers. As I recall, it was all developers who had different primary jobs just stringing stuff together on the side.
Thanks for watching, by the way! be sure to subscribe, and share this video if you haven't already!
Oh, I have no doubt a good writer could have done both, you're right about that. Just that given how the game was developed (as you mentioned, without dedicated writers), they could have done a better job if they'd focused more in the same direction. The civil war as it is just feels... inconsequential, while the main story at least has some steam, once it gets moving.
It really does. There's so little consequence or acknowledgement of the events or outcome of the war. The fact that no high king / queen is ever crowned is just a slap in the face.
Skyrim made me hate every freaking race
Made me also hate the sky and rimming. Only reasonable thing left to do now is hating on psychotrip.
That's why I love it. We irl don't like most people. Putting it in a grounded way is cool
Except argonions since you know there the best
@@apollyon1987 naw man im a racist :/
Is Ysgramor a hero?
It is so very relevant that the lore of Tamriel is delivered to us via in-universe books and dialogue. That's why it surprises me every time someone comes along and says "they did this wrong" or "I guess they retconned this", when the source of information they're using was deliberately written to be hyperbole or hearsay. The Pocket Guide to the Empire is a perfect example of this. What's more likely, that it's meant to be factual or that it's meant to demonstrate imperial propaganda and supremacy?
Don't take the in-game books at face value. Much like our world's own historical records and various articles, they're written by flawed minds biased by an agenda of some sort. The only way to see what's real is to witness it personally.
To those making the argument that previous descriptions of nords were merely "exaggerations" or the result of "unreliable narrators": I hear you, I understand this argument, but hear me out for a moment...
*Yes, the Elder Scrolls is full of conflicting accounts. Yes, most descriptions are made by in-game sources which can be flawed. Yes, it makes TOTAL sense for previous descriptions and previous examples of Nords to be more fantastical than "reality". You can totally explain things that way. But this begs the question...*
Why does Bethesda keep resorting to this trope?
Since Oblivion, it seems that every time we finally see something they've built up in a crazy, creative, and high-fantasy manner, it ends up being far more mundane and "normal" than we expected it to be. Why does Bethesda always seem to choose the most boring interpretation of everything they've created? Sure, in real life different cultures often get exaggerated and distorted by stereotypes and hearsay. But for Bethesda, it feels more like a crutch at this point. Think about it:
Imperials went from tattoo-covered, greco-byzantine amazonian aristocrats following thousands of different religions living in a gargantuan metropolis surrounded by endless jungle...to generic quasi-Romans living in Middle Earth.
Altmer went from math-obsessed, magitech nazi-elves living in a dark paradise with skyscrappers made of glass and cities made of coral, to generic high elves living in gray, boring "Rivendell" buildings.
See, for me personally, I loved that brief moment of The Elder Scrolls (Between Redguard and Morrowind) where everything was weird, alien, with crazy magitech and over-the-top races. Morrowind was never supposed to be the only "weird" part of Tamriel. There was a time when it was all weird in its own way. I get tired of "gritty, realistic" fantasy dominating the market. The Elder Scrolls stood out because it wasn't afraid to go crazy, and yet it remained grounded in very basic, relatable ways.
The nords were part of this weird world. I loved the idea of them being "sophisticated" savages. A race of people that are simultaneously romanticized and reviled. You especially saw this in Oblivion, where it felt like there was a lot of racism against the nords, even those that had "civilized" themselves. In Morrowind, I got the sense that their culture was legitimately different, even incompatible with the morality of the other races. But rather than seeing them as backwards savages, I saw them as a people with hidden depth, who were merely dismissed as savages because they were different.
I remember reading that there's a core of gleeful cynicism in nord society that drives their strange behavior. They're a people that believe the world is going to end at any moment (thanks to Alduin). They always think the worst is yet to come. But instead of despairing, they find joy in the aspects of life others fear. It's the reason they love violence, it's the reason they seem so gleeful in the worst of situations. It's the reason they sing songs about war and bloodshed. They're choosing to live their lives freely because they've accepted the inevitability of death. They're seen as brutal savages because they simply don't value life in the same way as others.
So imagine my surprise when I get to Skyrim, and find something entirely different. Not a tribal race of semi-nomadic explorers and sailors, living in a brutal land dominated by werebeasts and flying whales, who live in communal long-houses called meadhalls or giant fortress-cities, but a sanitized, "civilized", bland, normal race.
They made the nords "safe", and that's my biggest issue.
We need to face the facts: Bethesda has no desire to SHOW us any of the interesting stuff they came up with. The people who created that version of Tamriel are long gone, and their replacements don't have the desire or the ability to live up to what they envisioned.
So instead, they use the "unreliable narrator" trope as a crutch to retro-actively justify their uninspired, generic worldbuilding. They know that, no matter what, there will be fans out there who will justify their decisions using these exact arguments. The bottom line is the developers choose what's true and what's not. My argument is that their choices are boring, uninspired, and derivative of other fantasy worlds.
Read up on the effect of Puritanism on American culture.
Nobody believes they're the villain in their own narrative.
25 years after the Great War, the population of Skyrim would have been set back generations, and the greatest heroes and most capable men and women of the war generation would have been lost to that war - the remainder would be bitter and impoverished, and insult added to injury, forbidden to acknowledge their greatest hero.
All perfectly understandable, and derivative of corollaries in our own recent history (see: Post WW2 Soviet Union).
Your description of their earlier lore made them sound like Cimmerians, which would have been an interesting take on the culture, indeed. Too bad that's not the game we got, but given the above, understandable and accurate, imo.
Yeah. Bethesda really messed up the Nords in Skyrim. They were nothing like they were in past games. This is why I am very afraid of Elder Scrolls VI, or one of the many reasons anyway. This is also a reason I kind of do not want a game set in Argonia because I know Bethesda could never do the Argonians the justice they deserve.
TyranusRex721 my money is on valenwood for tes6.
I agree, but not just Argonia. No Akavir and No Elweyr either. Bethesda/Zenimax would ruin all of those places. I hope they pick somewhere (relatively) boring like High Rock, or maybe just make every single sequel be in Cyrodiil but in different time periods. That would keep the smashing of lore to a minimum.
Wasn't High Rock the location for TES 2: Daggerfall?
I guess they could do Orsinium or Hammerfell?
Why do you like the games at all if you think they'll mess everything up?
ShadowSpike Orsinium is only one very large city. Wouldn't work as a full game. We only really saw half of High Rock and part of Hammerfell in Daggerfall though so I honestly think High Rock would be a safe bet. They could show the parts we didn't see, and lets be honest Daggerfall looked awful so even the parts we have seen would look completely new. My money's either on High Rock or Hammerfell for ES6. Valenwood is also a possibility, but I'd put it behind the other two in terms of likelihood.
You are lumping all the Nords in with Ulfric's rebellion. There were plenty of Nord members of the Imperial army. Your comparisons are similar to thinking all Americans are racists just because of a vocal population in the south.
Except I explicitly mention the hypocrisy of the Imperial side as well. I placed a lot of emphasis on the rebellion because the game places so much emphasis on it. It's a constant subplot and yet its built on such a shaky foundation.
Not just the south
Not really. The Stormcloaks have every right to deny their oppressors and fight back against injustice; it's their duty, even. The Thalmor are evil - no one who has played the game denies this - yet so many people express their belief that the rebellion is wrong, pointless, or detrimental to Skyrim and its people. The Empire _used_ to stand for something; it used to represent a united people and it _was_ beneficial. As of Skyrim (the game), the Empire is not what it once was and is now just a puppet of the Aldmeri Dominion, enforcing the will of the Thalmor against the people of Skyrim; kidnapping, torturing, murdering, etc. The Empire we see in Skyrim is a shadow of its former self and the Stormcloaks _are_ the true sons and daughters of Skyrim. The game is just built so as to confuse you until you've played enough of it to see which side is right.
As for the Markarth incident, you need to do more research.
The Thalmor are the oppressors!
Hans Ollo is right, I think. The Empire is meant to be a shell of its former self and the civil war in Skyrim is meant to be a demonstration of the internal chaos that exists when something like the Empire fails. Yes, the rebellion plays into the Thalmor's hands, but the whole point of the quest where the Dragonborn finds out about their secret plan is that nobody else knows that that is what they want...and I don't care who you are, no player knew that either until they found those documents in the game.
The Markarth Incident is a little more complicated than you implied and you should familiarize yourself more with the history of it, but I see the Nords' and Empire's position in the Reach as similar to the United States' position concerning native tribes and reservations. Yes, it is completely hypocritcal when you compare it to the central ethical message that is broadcast by the culture, but don't you think that makes Skyrim more believable and real? I mean, in the real world, Germans aren't all stuck up bureaucratic jerks, Japanese people aren't all robotically perfect at everything they do, and not every American is a gun-toting look-at-me-I'm-so-great patriot. Cultures and societies are a complex tapestry of different people with different thoughts and opinions and ideals and nobody is ever perfect. I think that's part of the brilliance of the Elder Scrolls races. They aren't perfect and they don't fit a uniform identity, despite the prevalence of racist stereotypes and uneven characterizations that others make of them.
So, yes, Nords are kind of hypocritical jerks and they are kind of oblivious about it, but welcome to the human race. I think it's infinitely more interesting that they replicate true humanity in this way than simply having a race of wild Northern horned-helmeted brutes who all fit this perfect stereotype of idealized noble savage warriors...
EDIT: all that being said, I was never all that interested in the Nords, anyway. I mean, it was cool getting a first-hand look at their homeland, but there wasn't much interest for me to have lost to begin with. I'm still just waiting patiently for a better view of the Summerset Isles or Elseweyr or Valenwood. Hammerfell would be cool, too.
Thanks for sharing your personal bias opinion.
You're welcome!
Being honest if i wouldn't like people talos or ysgramor being human or elf considering Ysgramor is famous for essentially comitting genocide on the snow elves and talos tried to take over the world.
I'll post something I posted on a Skyrim community on G+ here.
I imagine that a lot of people here think the Stormcloaks are right. But maybe I'll give you a perspective you hadn't considered.
The biggest contention the Stormcloaks have with the Empire is bending the knee to the Thalmor and outlawing worship of Talos. The problem is, this shouldn't have even been an issue for the Nords at all. Talos is an Imperial god, worshiped in Cyrodiil with smaller cults elsewhere(like in Morrowind, for example). He has a counterpart in the Nordic pantheon, called Ysmir. Yes, the one the bandits shout about.
Ysmir is part of who would become Talos, though in origin is a different entity who was very much against the Imperial gods. He himself was known as Wulfharth, and was elected High King after his predecessor's death. His Thu'um was so powerful, he couldn't verbally take the oath of office without injuring everyone in the vicinity. Immediately after his oath was sworn, he had his scribes write a decree: that worship of all Imperial gods was forbidden in Skyrim, and that the Nordic pantheon was reinstated.
He was so set on removing the Imperial religion from Skyrim that he had temples burned to ashes and priests burned at the stake. He was called Ysmir, Dragon of the North, by the Imperials for not only his heresy, but his wrath. His wrath continued, forcing the Orcs out of the eastern portion of Skyrim. He himself fought, and when he found the chief of the Orcs he shouted him apart so soundly the Orc chief's body ended up in Oblivion.
But he wasn't all fury. He swallowed a thundercloud, using its heat to keep his troops warm. For this they called him the Breath of Kyne, another Nordic goddess. Another Nordic god, Orkey, cursed the Nords so that all of them who were alive at the time of the curse became children. He did this by summoning the ghost of Alduin, who them stole the years of the Nords lives from them.
Shor, another god of the Nords, fought with Alduin in the heavens, and Wulfharth learned the shout he would need to restore the Nord's lives from their battling. But the shout wrecked his body. He restored all of his life, but added more years, becoming an ancient man. And then he died. For the first time.
Some time later, while the Dunmer and Dwemer were at war, Dagoth Ur approached the Nords claiming to know where the Heart of Shor was located. Ysgramor shouted from Sovngarde, so that the Nords wouldn't be tricked by Dagoth Ur, and they took advantage of the battle between the Dwarves and Dark Elves so that they could get some of their lands back. Because they knew that Dagoth Ur, even if he knew where Shor's Heart was located, would never give the Nords their god back. But Dagoth Ur promised that it was the nature of the Dark Elves to betray each other, and he said that Shor's Heart was among them. He convinced the Nords to trust him, but the Tongues didn't trust Ur. They shouted Shor's ghost back into the world, and from Ysmir's ashes he rebirthed the old king. Dagoth Ur pledged to lead the Nords, but Shor didn't trust him. Despite this, he accepted Ur's aid, installing Ysmir as a second leader so that their could be someone to truly guide the people.
Shor was right not to trust Ur. Ur had devised a plan to trap him beneath Red Mountain, the destroy the Nords. Ur had learned that Shor intended on destroying the Dwarves and all who allied with them. Despite their bad blood, the Nords met with the Orcs, and forged an alliance to go to war with the Elves in the east. Nerevar went to challenge Shor on Red Mountain, carrying Keening, a dagger forged from the sound of the moons' shadows. With him were Dumac Dwarfking who carried the divine hammer Sunder and Alandro Sul, an immortal child of Azura who wore the Wraith Maille. Before their battle Shor retrieved his heart. Dumac bashed Shor with his hammer, turning the god's heart corporeal. Just after, Ur turned on Dumac and slew him on the spot. Nerevar was enraged and went to attack Ur, but Shor killed him first. He feigned death before it truly came, and stabbed Shor through the heart with Keening, slicing it from his body. All the while Wulfharth was fighting Sul. Sul proved too powerful, but Wulfharth shouted his eyes out before a blast from Vivec sent the Ash King to Oblivion. But, before his ashes reached Oblivion, Kyne took them and scattered them across the sky, which turned the red of blood spilled in betrayal.
Now, why do I say this here and not just point you to the Five Songs of Wulfharth, which you could easily buy ingame or read online? Well, because some of you wouldn't. Just as some of you skipped the above.
Anyway, I really bring it up to provide the context for this statement: Ysmir is not Talos. His soul was needed to produce Talos, yes, but they aren't the same god. Talos is more Hjalti Early-beard or Tiber Septim than the others that make up his soul. Talos is an Imperial God.
Take a moment to remember the horse thief from the intro. Which gods does he call out for as you all enter Helgen? They are also Imperial gods. And while their names may be similar to Nordic ones, they are not the same gods, just as Ysmir and Talos aren't. The Imperials already won. Look at every temple, shrine, or holy person in the game. They all worship or are made for the worship of the Imperial Nine or Eight Divines. The biggest rallying point the Nords have is a god they shouldn't be worshiping. And not only do they worship him, they worship him in place of one of their greatest heroes.
I'll go a step further. The Nords are essentially Imperials with a different accent by the Stormcloak Uprising. The Nords used to adore fine drink and fine song, and now... They have no meadhalls, and the only institute dedicated to music in their country is more interested than burning effigies than singing about the people those effigies represent. How many times have you heard the bards sing about Ragnar the Red? All of them were trained at the school, yet the only song of any legendary figure they know is about a boastful drunkard.
And onto architecture, the Nords abandoned their original way of living, which made much more sense considering the cold. Though the Nords do still use wood in the construction of their homes, originally they built their homes halfway underground to keep them warm. This technique is gone by the time the game Skyrim takes place in. They were also masters of stonecraft, yet by the time of Skyrim the ruins their ancestors built thousands of years prior have come to be mostly buried under snow and soil and abandoned for the more Cyrodiilic hamlets and cities. Even as you walk down from Helgen, Ralof will comment that he's afraid to live in the shadow of Bleak Falls Barrow. To live beneath the majesty of such a construct should be an honor, not something to fear.
The structure of Nordic society is also much more Imperial. Their Jarls are essentially Cyrodiilic Counts in all but name. Gone are the warrior-poet kings beholden to only those they ruled, and fiercely fighting to defend and expand their kingdoms. Ulfric at least somewhat embodies this to a degree, but he gives it up in the end. Yes, the Moot decides who is High King, a position that his somehow still survived. But it's ultimately meaningless. The High King isn't needed to unite the Nords anymore, because all of the Jarls are complacent to stand within their hold borders and not seek adventure and build strength through adversity. Ulfric tells you to hunt an icewraith to become one of his soldiers. The old Nords would send their boys to do this, and when the boys came back with an ice wraith's carcass in the dead of winter, they would become men.
So the Stormcloak's greatest claim to righteousness is founded on an Imperial beliefs. Nordic society and religion have become Imperial. The Nords themselves act like Imperials. And so there's no point in the rebellion. A united set of Imperials is better suited to fight the Aldmeri Dominion than the Imperials and the totally-not-Imperials.
tl;dr the Nords have lost everything that made them Nords, the Stormcloaks don't know what they're fighting for, and a united Imperial front is best to beat the Dominion.
I came in thinking I would disagree, however this was brilliantly made and I think I agree, we all know argonians are the best race anyway
Haha glad you liked it! Be sure to share this video and subscribe if you haven't already!
I personally still disagree.
Skyrim belongs to the nord
Actually it belongs to the Reachmen, Falmer, and Dunmer they stole the land from. If you think conquering land makes it yours then that's a valid opinion, but the Thalmor think that as well.
The Nords were the first humans on Tamriel. The Falmer and the Dwemer killed each other in the Aetherium Wars, but you could argue that they were on Skyrim first. As for the Reachmen, they invaded Skyrim and took the Reach by force, occupying it for two years. They're flesh-eating demon worshipers.
Actually you're 100% wrong on the last part. The Reach was stolen from High Rock by the nords about a thousand years ago. It wasn't originally Skyrim land. It was High Rock. That's why parts of eastern High Rock is known as "the western Reach". It was the land of the tribal witchmen, mostly of breton descent. Sure, you could argue that might makes right, that the nords won the land by virtue of victory, but the thalmor feel the same way about their right to enforce their laws on the nords. You can't have it both ways.
Also, we have no idea if the reachmen religion necesitates flesh eating and sacrifice, or if the forsworn are just extremists driven to the brink. Know why? Because the nords outlawed their religion. It's also worth noting that when the reachmen took over Markarth, things were surprisingly peaceful. Go back and play the game. Go to Markarth. Notice how the nords always talk about how the reachmen conquered the city? But not a single one of them has anything to say about what they did when they ruled it? Isn't it weird that they completely avoid the actual events of that 2 year period? They just gloss over it and mention how Ulfric saved them all? Ever wonder why?
Read a book called "The Bear of Markarth". In it, you learn the reachmen treated the nords with basic decency. There was little disruption to their daily lives, especially when compared to an "average" conquest, and were even in talks with the Empire to be recognized as an official territory. Then Ulfric came in, killed every man woman and child, native or nord, who refused to take up arms against the reachmen, and "liberated" the city.
Now of course this account could be biased, but it's the only account we have. It would also be pretty difficult to fabricate some of these claims. There would be diplimatic records between the Empire and the Reachmen, eyewitness accounts of children being killed by the nords etc. Based on all the information we have, this account is as close as we can come to the truth.
The reachmen can't own land, and if they do it's stolen from them. They're thrown in prison for spurious reasons to work on the mines. Their religion is outlawed, while the nords complain that their genocidal, regicidal (See: Cuhlecain), backstabbing god-king is banned. The nords got what was coming to them as far as I'm concerned.
Also, the nedes likely got to Tamriel before the nords did. They moved south and most of them became the Imperials, the rest eventually died out or interbred with nords, elves, and redguards. The people that would eventually become the nords were among the last of a series of atmoran expeditions to Tamriel. It's one of the regions nords retained so much of their atmoran heritage: they've been on tamriel for a shorter period of time.
+Daenerys Targaryen look up "Snow Elf" and then come back to me.
+Hans Ollo Have you not heard of the Nedic Tribes? They lived in High Rock and Cyrodiil in the Merethic Era, and breed the Bretons after generations of mating with High Elves. Considering Reachmen are most-likely Breton(Skill in Magic, and their location in Skyrim). Nords were the last Humans to reach Tamriel coming in the Early-to-Mid first Era. And since the Nedes died off before the First Era, we can make the assumption that either Reachmen, or atleast some type of Breton, occupied the area long before any Atmoran or Nord.
Sound's like something a damn elf would say.
What's this?? Someone else with an opinion? Not on my watch! In all seriousness I find most human races in Skyrim kind of arrogant or just bland. Many nords in particular just seemed short sighted and just as arrogant as the Thalmor. More often than not I found myself excited to see khajiit, argonians, orcs and dark elves more than any of the humans except maybe the Alikr guys. I will however say that the few "good" nords I talked to were probably the most loyal and kind hearted out of all the human races. So they do have that going for them when they actually care.
1. You get your own god stolen.
2. 30 years of religieus persecution.
3. The empire lost the capital to the thalmor, they won it back it was their first real victory. The emipre signed their surrender.
4. The red guards had to give up half their nation they refused and fought on. They got kicked outta the empire fighting the thalmor to a standstill (alone), which got them their land back. This was right after the empire surrendered.
Here we are 25 years later and you are telling ulfric and his men to fight with the empire? Strange thing they dint help the red guards. They stoot and looked how the thalmor took mother fathers sons and daughters?
It first elder scrolls game was skyrim, and the Nord's were my favourite, but when I played oblivion and morrowind, my god, they felt so much more unique
This is EXACTLY my point, dude! Didn't they feel a lot more interesting?
I think The Skaal are the closest to the nords described in the older books
yeah, but I think they are way too peaceful
Skaal are kinda like inuits
Daire Crilly so they were raiders then? Sorry never read the books.
@@dairecrilly3097 similar actually they are like the sami ppl from northern Scandinavia
Skyrim was my first game. I like and sympathize with them, like Bethesda intended. But they did it too much. I naturally have a distaste for the Empire and side with the rebellion only when I play a Nord, otherwise I'm neutral. Skyrim is still an interesting and fun game and I still like the Nords.
Skyrim belongs to the Nord remember that.
Says who? I'm sure the falmer, dunmer, orcs, and bretons / reachmen think it belongs to them. They were all there first.
psychotrip The Land does not belong to the who first come.
So then what determines who it belongs to?
psychotrip The Anatolia was belongs to the Greek people but now Anatolia is belongs to the Turks because the Greek people couldn't defend their land but Turks did. Falmers,bretons,dunmers couldn't defend Skyrim but Nords did.
So by that logic, everything the Thalmor are doing is justified because the nords haven't stopped them yet. By that logic, the parts of Hammerfell in control of the Dominon rightfully belong to them because the redguards couldn't hold it. By your logic, the Imperials own Skyrim because it's part of their Empire (and let's ignore the fact that they built the roads, forts, and trade routes that keep Skyrim prosperous).
And before you bring up the possibility of the Stormcloaks winning The Civil War, the only thing determining who wins is what side you choose in the beginning. So, the Civil War is won because of you (regardless of your race) not because of the nords. So we're left with a nation that can't defend its own land unless it has a super-powered dragon in human form.
So, who does Skyrim belong to again?
Why is "hating the Nords" so popular?
I know my ancestors are smiling down on me. Can you say the same imperial?
Probably not, considering most souls end up recycled through the dream-sleeve and Aetherius is temporary for mortals.
skyrim belongs to the nords!!!
the nords stole skyrim from the snow elves, so why can't the thalmor do it?
the rise of the falmer is coming ;) :D
they have skill, numbers, and are learning to reclaim their intellect, the aldmeri dominion won't be safe as long as dwemer technology and falmer are so close with a potential for disaster.
the snow elves tried to wipe out nords first so karma is a bitch, and they did not exterminate them they chased them away. the dwemer was the ones that enslaved them and made them into falmer.
shores bones i now that bethesda destroyed the nords by removing the nordic pantheon as the main religion. cookie? no they should have been more cookie sadly most of the nords are just like imperials in skyrim. but boring hell no they have one of the most bad ass history in tamriel.
yeah bethesda should make more Sequels like the adventures redguard, dwemer game would also be nice. or game whit the slode aldmeri war lol.
Errr not so fast there... The Forsworn worship Daedra, entities we can all agree are pretty damn evil. Since a deity has more power the more worshipers it has, it's necessary to prevent the Forsworn from performing their rites. The Thalmor have another goal in mind. Talos seems to have many aspects and one of them is a slayer of Elves. The more people worship Talos the God, the more power he has, and the Thalmor want the opposite. Furthermore, the highest ranking Justiciars in the Thalmor know about the real motives of the Thalmor; unmake the world. They want to return to their original form as spirits. That's what Ancano was doing with the Eye of Magnus. It's all fairly more complicated that hypocrisy though I agree that the Stormcloaks are pretty damn hypocritical. There are also Nords that want to side with the Empire, regardless of religion, because they understand that the Thalmor will only be defeated by an united empire. Of course... we didn't get the Nords that conquered Skyrim after the Night of Tears. We don't get the Nords like Ysgramor. We don't even get the Nordic pantheon.... just the Imperial version of Skyrim with scrawny women and pompous fops - the opposite of what Nords are supposed to be: Bulky, strong, fearless and actually very strategic in combat. I don't hate the Nords, I hate who wrote them in Skyrim.
I always choose stormcloaks because of the mission in whiterun where the Thalmor kidnaps a greymane son and is keeping him prisoner torturing him, I feel personally about that because eurland greymane is a guy I admire, he is pure nord to me.
The way I see it, none of that would have happened if not for Ulfric's rebellion. We learn early in the game that before the Markarth Incident, nords worshipped Talos and were rarely punished for it if at all. The thalmor manipulated Ulfric to start the rebellion so they could have an excuse to increase their presence in Skyrim, further infuriating the nords and dividing the Empire. It all goes back to Ulfric's actions during the Markarth Incident. By perpetuating the war, you're helping the Thalmor break up the Empire.
psychotrip so the thalmor made ulfric basically, that further intices me that I should choose the faction against them no ,after how radical the leader is
The Empire is against the Thalmor as well. A united Empire is the only thing that can stop the Thalmor. As you learn in the imperial storyline, the Empire has no plan on negotiating with the Thalmor. They signed the Concordat to buy themselves time before going back to war. Recall that a united Empire barely beat back the Thalmor in the first place, and even then they had to sign a shitty treaty. Dividing the Empire can do nothing but help the Thalmor in the long run.
The Empire are full of BS. They are just puppets of the Thalmor, kidnapping, torturing, and murdering their own people in fear that the elves will do it to them. The Stormcloaks are doing what is right: defending their homeland and uniting their people against an invading foe. If you had ever actually played through the Stormcloak storyline (which I know you haven't from your video and comments) you would know that a united Skyrim is more powerful than a divided one and is more powerful than a crippled broken Empire that is only allowed to survive to be used by the Dominion. Bowing to the Thalmor can do nothing but help the elves and hurt the people of Skyrim. Imperial dog.
@@hanburgundy4317 , I know this is from awhile back ago, but I agree 100 percent.
Psychotrip: the nords are hypocrites. me: how so? starts talking about the reachmen. me: oh shit that's a good point
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed!
i actually wish you had more options of who to side with. the forsworn and the thalmor are two examples. if i want to play as an elven race, i might agree with the thalmor and be on their side. i wish that option existed. same with the forsworn, it would be cool to play as a reachman and help them win back their freedoms or retake markarth. things like this would have really opened up the game.
yes! i am actually trying right now (for the 3rd time) to do a playthrough where i side with the stormcloaks. i struggle with it because of Ulfric being the worst just in general, the racist nature of those on that side (since I often play a Breton or Bosmer), and the shortsightedness of the whole war in general (with it actually playing into the thalmor's plans and all..). I would love for more options that make the stormcloaks more appealing. My character this time is a Nord huntress who's background is that she was kidnapped by wood elves as a child and, after years of basically being a slave, killed her captors and journeyed back to Skyrim. This is the only way I could justify being a stormcloak. :P
Kayla Wardle you should be honored tonfight for ulfric hes defending the land ur character was born in from the corrupted empire. And word of advice dont let liberal politics disguised in a game corrupt ur mind. Games tv movies etc all tainted with liberal politics its sickening. Bethesda favoring the empire and portraying the nords as badly as they do in skyrim cant ubsee whats going on here . Have u ppl gone mad? Wheres the racist bretons or argonians or elves.... i dont see them. I only see nords who r racist. Liberal self hate injected into video games as if real life propoganda and white self hate wasnt enough.....its ok we will take it.......cus this type of shit only wakes ppl up to more n more liberal bs we love it . Its the reason trump got elected so i say keep it up...the liberals are digging their own hole too much too soon. Guaranteeing trump for 2020 . Hail ulfric the true high king
KingSoap88 88 High Elves are pretty racist but other than that you've convinced me. Hail Ulfric
@@indigorune i am doing a third playthrough right now and i just cant seen to choose the stormcloaks side at all.. i dont agree with nothing they do.. in fact i actually think the that forbidding talos is a good thing
@Kyle Pedoslayer i also dont agree with some of the stuff the imperials are doing. so i never touch the civil war quest.
"Two things I can't stand: intolerance and the Dutch" sums up this review nicely from my perspective.
The Nords are my favourite race. My biggest issue with them in Skyrim is how such a proud people fighting for religious freedom have still adopted the Cyrodillic pantheon. E.g they call Kyne Kynareth and the rest of their Gods don't even have temples
THIS! This exactly!! The irony is palpable. Bethesda destroyed the nordic religion.
The nords founded the Empires…
Analyzing fictional politics using irl opinions
I have a feeling most of this who disliked or bashed this video, didn't even watch it.... I went from neutral, to agreeing in full... You made great points.
Skyrim butchered the Nords and their lore.
Pretty much, bro.
Honestly Skyrim was just a dumbed down shitty sequel of Oblivion none of us wanted.
While i don't agree with nearly all the things in this video, i still agree that nords always seemed cooler in the lore than in game. Personally i liked it better how morrowind represented nords, but still skyrims nords aren't trash imo.
My problem is that skyrim belong to the nords..... only the nords ,
You see that bullshit
Skyrim belongs to the Nords
If I had nickle for every time someone commented with this meme, I'd be rich. XD
psychotrip Good to be round like minded people then
@@Paul-ns3ix Doesn't change how boring the nords are though.
psychotrip Sounds like something a milk drinker would say
@@Paul-ns3ix Maybe if you nords drank milk growing up instead of mead you'd be more intelligent ;D
I absolutely agree with the points you're making, and while the Nords' culture has suffered for it, that's exactly why I find the civil war so intriguing.
For the most part, games portray similar rebellions in a very "black and white" kind of way. There's the evil, oppressive government and the heroic ragtag group of rebels, and basically your choice is "ultimate power on the side of evil or winning the unthinkable fight for the good guys". In real life, it rarely is that simple.
Skyrim's approach is way more realistic. The Stormcloak rebels are flawed, they have their reasons to fight, but they (specifically Ulfric) don't seem to care about the bigger picture. Meanwhile, you have the Imperials who are basically being oppressed themselves by the Thalmor. None of them are happy about the situation, but they are trying to maintain peace in these troubled times by any means necessary, even if it means fighting the rebels whose goals they generally agree with.
Also, there are very big variations in terms of "dedication" on the side of the Stormcloaks. You have your cookie cutter racists and bigots, some religious nutjobs and of course Ulfric "Nords rule GTFO Imperials" Stormcloak. But you also have reasonable people, people who got caught in the fight and basically see the fight as no more than a fight for freedom, religious and otherwise. And that is, at its heart, understandable.
So in conclusion, if you're a fan of Nords from other Elder Scrolls games, their portrayal in Skyrim might disappoint you. But as a standalone game, I think it creates a fascinating environment that, for once, isn't as easy to decipher as most video games tend to be.
I mostly favor playing non-human races on RPGs.
One thing I hate in a series is when the writing is inconsistent. The Elder Scrolls is infamous for this. Most Skyrim players don't know how the lore was much more compelling in the older games. Those whom do can see the potential Skyrim wasted. The excuse of Bethesda stripping out or removing elements in favor of the mass market is a lame one. The casual crowd only want the bare minimum. Catering solely on them means there needs to be sacrifices. Sacrifices that make the experience shallow and bland. Bethesda could had crafted better stories to cater to everyone. Without such sacrifices. The Witcher 3 proves that open world games can have good stories. The casual crowd and the hardcore crowd would all benefit for this.
Couldn't have said it better myself dude.
It’s too bad people hated on Fallout 76 so bad that Bethesda’s probably going to shut down before they can make TES6
@@tarjet3867 You said that as if Fallout 76 didn't deserve the scrutiny.
He felt edgy at the beginning saying he is a racist for mythical people, but you bet your ass he wouldn't say shit about the red guard or say that he is racist against the red guard.
I'm a racist, but a better racist than you because my race is human and my hate goes entirely towards the elves, especially altmer, who are the true enemy of skyrim.
I've only played one character in Skyrim and I wanted to be a Nord in order to fell really at home in Skyrim. At first I didn't knew nothing at all about the Stormcloak rebelion or who was Talos, I only knew that Imperials wanted to killme because they thought I was a rebel, no questions asked. Thankfully alduin came to save me and in the heat of battle the stormcloaks welcomed me as one of their own, even offerme the armor of a fallen comrade, in that moment it seemed very simple: the fucking imperials wanted to kill me for no reason and the stormcloaks invited me to join the rebelion as a brother, so I became a proud nord rebel. I thought the most immersive way to play skyrim was to behave like a true nord, go on adventures exploring caves, haunting fighting bandits and even started worshiping Talos. At first i didn´t care about the main quest because i wanted to gain strenght and weapons to be the true dragonborn skyrim needed me to be, so i started to go around helping people with their siple problems gaining experience as I became aware of the poblems and relations between the diferent races who lived in skyrim. I can't remember when I became a racist but I started hating elfs (Maybe it had something to do with the fact that a thalmor patroll atacked me with no reason). The first time i had to face some bandits was when in tryed to cross their bridge, I tryed to intimidate them and they atacked me; i had to kill them in self defence but I took no pleasure in slaying those bastards because I saw a bit of myself in them, like me they were only trying to survive in this hostile land and i hd to kill them because they were fool enough to atack me. The elves were different, I enjoyed killing them because they saw me as an animal who could never comprehend their natural superiority, so i had to prove them wrong by showing how a nord dumbass could still cut through them like they were cake (and i had so much fun while doing it).
I continued my adventure until I had to infiltrate the thalmor embasy, where I found out that not only they control the empire but they also had tortured my Jarl Ulfric in order to provoke im to star the civil war. Their true intention was to destroy the empire's power and watlh as they also killed all the elve's oposition betwen te human people, and what better way to do it than starting a never ending civil war between humans? Then I realiced that the empire was doomed and they will forever be economic and political slaves of the altmer and the only hope for human people was the stormcloak rebelion beacuse if they don't win we will be forever slaves under elven peace and control. The empire must fall in order to free us from the altmer controll.
The people of Scandinavia in the middle ages were mainly peaceful farmers, but they didn't write anything down, so only the deeds of the vikings that sailed out and raided Europe is recorded in history books by their victims. That seems to be the case here as well :)
Wow i never knew about how awes- i mean FOOLISH THE NORDS ARE HHAHHAHA ALTMER IS BEST
Being real though i started in Skyrim and i always hated the nords because they seemed like generic humans
Which as you can see made me love altmer xD
I Never Played Oblivion and have played very little of morrowind however Skyrim is my most played game ever, which i've been playing games since i was about 4 (now i'm 13)
But if i knew about that Nord Lore Something tells me Altmer wouldn't be my favorite.